Speaks For Itself

This is posted on a Facebook page called Gay Marines. At last check it had gotten close to 36,000 "Likes" with close to 8,500 comments and almost 6,000 shares.

From the FB page: "Welcome to Gay Marines on Facebook. This page exists to provide information and discussion pertinent to gay Marines, their spouses, significant others, friends and allies." 

You can find the FB link here: Gay Marines or you can do a "search" with those words.

Enlarge Your Manhood!

There's a feature on Blogger where you can use a filter to try and stop spam from ending up on your blog. We use to use it but I turned it off a few months ago. Not sure why... I like to tinker around with gadgets sometimes when I'm bored (see it's Brad's fault.. if he would keep me entertained, then this kind of thing wouldn't happen!)

We haven't gotten much spam but there's been a few things popping up in the comments section. One was an advertisement for Maybelline mascara and if you clicked the link you could get a free sample. I deleted that comment and then told Brad about it and he got mad at me. "You could have at least gotten the sample. That stuffs expensive!" I can never win those kind of arguments so I just said I was sorry.

I tried to go back and find the deleted Maybelline comment, which was pretty easy to do, but when I tried to figure out how to restore the comment, I accidentally clicked some button and then the "Comments" screen blinked four or five times and then went totally blank! Totally blank. White screen. Nothing on it! It looked like I had deleted every single comment ever left by anybody since we started the blog! Almost 4,000 comments lost! Gone out into cyberspace somewhere.

I just wailed, "Nooooooooooooooooooo! Oh my God!!!!"

Brad was in the other room and started screaming, "Matty!!! What's the matter?" as he was running into the room. He thought I had hurt myself (again) and started checking to see if there was any blood on the floor or spurting out of my body anywhere.

He just looked at me and said, "What's the matter? What happened? Are you okay?" I looked at him and said, "I lost your Maybelline. I can't believe it. I lost your Maybelline and all the comments, too!"

I felt like crying. Just crying.

I finally calmed down enough to explain what happened and he sat down and did a few clicks and got everything restored. I am no longer allowed to tinker with the blog innards unless he's there. Which I agreed to. I don't even want to know what he did to restore things because it'll just make me more curious about Blog Innards and that can be a dangerous thing. Brad is now the Official Blog Innards Webmaster! I'm am now his Lowly Servant. And gladly! Don't need that stress, believe me!

Well, we got another spam comment yesterday. Guess what it was for?

PERMANENTLY ENLARGE YOUR MANHOOD!

Get Incredible Gains While You Sleep.

Wake up to 3 to 4 additional inches!

Pictures and Testimony from Satisfied Studs!

Click here to satisfy your partner!

So I'm sitting there reading this.

My hands are off the keyboard.

The highlighted link is staring at me.

My fingers start to twitch.

I'm starting to get lightheaded.

My heart starts pounding.

What damage can I do by clicking a link?

Brad's in the kitchen.

I'm sitting there staring at the link that will take me to pictures of "Satisfied Studs."

What's a boy to do, I ask you?

"Matty! Can you come here a sec?"

I have this startle response like I've been caught doing something wrong. Takes me a few seconds to blink my eyes and get myself back to where I am.

"Be right there."

I get to the kitchen and Brad's rolling out some dough for a pie he's making.

"Can you turn the dial on the stove to "simmer" and stir the filling for about 30 seconds?"

I look at the stove like it's an alien monster and make my slow approach.

"Are you okay?"

"What?"

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah. I'm fine."

I turn the dial to simmer and pick up the wooden spoon and start stirring.

"You know, we need more counter space."

"What?"

"We need more counter space. I don't have enough space to spread things out. Think maybe sometime we could enlarge the counter space?'"

"Enlarge the counter?"

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah, we could enlarge the counter."

Brad keeps looking at me while I'm stirring. I can see him out of the corner of my eye.

When I finish I head back to the dining room and slowly look at the computer screen. "Enlarge Your Manhood!" It's like a message from outer space. Like some alien is hypnotizing me. Taking control of my mind.

To click, or not to click. That is the question.

"Matty?"

I just about jump out of my seat! Brad's standing behind me and I turn to look at him and he's looking from me to the screen and back to me.

I slide over in my chair so he can see the screen.

He very slowly moves the laptop in his direction, out of my reach, and very slowly closes the top.

He's now staring at me with this little boy grin on his face and reaches for my hands.

"Baby, we don't need some product to 'expand your manhood'. Just watch."

Every thing's under control in the kitchen and he leads me to the bedroom.

An hour later, while I'm taking a shower to clean up, Brad goes to the computer and deletes the "Satisfied Studs" spam comment. After all, he's the Official Blog Innards Webmaster.

I think he also put the spam filter back on. No need for any outside help with Increasing our Manhood. We get that for free.

So I'm off to the store now for his Maybelline mascara and some eyeliner. That we still have to pay for!

Hop Against Homophobia

We're so excited about Hop Against Homophobia we couldn't wait until the Official Beginning, which is the week of May 17 - 20.

We signed up our blog to participate for this important cause, and we hope you'll check it out by clicking here: Hop Against Homophobia.

The purpose is twofold: to raise awareness about homophobia and to strengthen the gay fiction genre.

We'll have more to say about this as we get closer to the Official Week, but for now, we hope you'll check it out. Again, it's at: Hop Against Homophobia.

A Valentine to Remember

We've shared some of Sammy's poetry here (always with her permission, even though she says when she gives it to us, it's a gift and ours to use however we like). If you remember from last week, we thought it would be fun to ask for some ideas about different sexual role plays for after our Valentine's Day date. Sammy posted a short description of her idea (you can see what she wrote on the February 16th post), and then she sat down and expanded on it. What you see here is an incredibly well-written and sizzling hot short story. We wanted to share it with all of you, but be forewarned... have a fan close by so you can cool down or get ready to jump in a cold shower to get your body temperature back to normal! Thank you, Sammy!

A Valentine to Remember
... for Matty and Bradley
by Sammy

Bradley shrugged on his coat and walked toward the main doors of the restaurant. I can’t believe Matt just left me here. How could I have gotten this so wrong? I mean the guy seemed so into me — Jesus, he even left that damn baseball cap of his at home for the night. Although him, naked, wearing nothing but that cap…god, why couldn’t that have been the way this night ended!

Bradley reached down to adjust himself; the zipper of his Tuxedo pants had begun to dig into his rapidly growing erection. The little lacy red thong he had put on earlier in the evening was doing nothing to protect his aching cock. After hours of begging his sister, she had gone and purchased the underwear for him — just so he could surprise Matt tonight.

Matt had confessed just a week before that he often fantasized about seeing Bradley in sexy underwear and Bradley had grabbed onto that with both hands—well, both cheeks, so to speak! Guess I won’t be showing off that little surprise tonight!  Instead here I am going home…alone…in a rented limo.  Damn…just damn! 

The limo was sitting idling curbside. With a sigh, Bradley pulled open the back door and bent down to get in the back seat. Huh? The light must be out ... funny it was working fine earlier this evening. Thinking that he should probably tell the driver, Bradley began to turn in his seat, moving to get out of the limo to go up front and speak to the guy when he felt his wrists being grabbed and shoved behind his back. 

Quick as lightening, he felt the rope slip around them and cinch tight. What the hell?? Bradley began to struggle trying to pull away from the man who had grabbed him and now had one arm firmly around his waist forcing him up against the intruder’s chest. Suddenly Bradley felt a warm, wet tongue slowly gliding up the side of his neck causing a shiver to run down his spine. Two soft lips wrapped around his earlobe as sharp teeth bit gently into his flesh, causing a moan to escape from Bradley’s mouth. 

Bradley felt the hot breath flow down his damp neck as the man spoke, whispering into his ear: "Your mine baby, all mine. There's no sense in struggling. I have you right where I want you and before this night is over you're going to be begging me to never let you go.” 

Bradley felt the power of that voice all the way down to his toes. He thought he should open his mouth, scream for help. He needed help, didn’t he? For some reason, Bradley couldn’t shake off the heat of lust that seemed to crowd his thoughts. 

He tried once more to open his mouth to speak. He heard a breathy chuckle as the man spoke: “Oh don't bother calling for help. The driver won’t be of any assistance. It just so happens he is on the company payroll. Damn, I must have forgotten to mention that this is a company limo — my company limo.” 

And with that, Bradley felt the man’s lips close on the soft flesh right below his ear and begin to caress it with his tongue, sucking and licking, pulling up a mark on his neck. Bradley moaned once more, all thoughts of struggling to escape falling far, far away.

"I watched you all night long. Every time those lips of yours wrapped around that wineglass I imagined them wrapping around my cock, just like this.”  Bradley felt a hand caress his cock, causing his hips to thrust upward against the hot hand as if begging for more. Once again a husky laugh echoed through the cab of the limo. 

As the hand continued to caress his traitorous flesh, Bradley felt the hard thrust of the man’s cock against his thigh. Jesus, the man was huge … and hard as nails. “Can you feel what you do to me baby?" The man wrenched Bradley’s face back toward his, taking him in a hard and fast kiss. Pulling back just slightly, Bradley felt the man’s hot tongue slip out and gently lick across his lips causing Bradley’s mouth to open just wide enough for it to slip inside.

As he thrust over and over into Bradley’s mouth, his hand stroked with increasing pressure on Bradley’s cock, up and down, in and out until Bradley felt his eyes roll back in his head as waves of pleasure crashed into him over and over. 

With a whimper, Bradley felt the man pull back slightly. His glazed eyes came to rest on the man’s face, only faintly discernible in the darkening gloom of the back seat. The man smiled and his teeth gleamed white as he ran his tongue over them, reminding Bradley of a vampire about to ravish his next victim. 

“Do you know what I’m going to do to you when I get you home, pretty boy?”  Bradley shook his head, fighting back yet another whimper. “I’m going to suck that luscious cock of yours until you scream my name over and over again.” 

Bradley closed his eyes, unable to stifle the moan that escaped as the image of that hot mouth wrapped around his cock flashed into his mind. Once more a hot wet tongue caressed his neck, gliding slowly up across his chin and pushing against his lips, seeking entrance. Like a wild man, Bradley drew that tongue into his mouth, sucking and pulling while bucking up against the hand that still caressed his hard cock.  Bradley lost all control moaning into the man’s mouth and saying over and over again, “yes, yes, fuck me, oh god, please fuck me”. 

As the limo pulled up to the front of Bradley and Matty’s house, Matty chuckled softly one last time and said, “Lover, your wish is my command.  Happy Valentine’s day, baby.” Bradley pulled back and said, “You, me, inside, naked, with just the cap…NOW!” Matty smiled…and obeyed.

True Colors

Sometimes Brad and I like to check out blogs and websites that our Followers have. Well, a little birdie whispered in our ear that an artist had been inspired by our blog and had created and dedicated some recent work to us.

The artist refers to herself as a "scrapmaker" and "tutorial writer," and to be honest, neither of us had ever heard of scrapmaking before, so it's hard for us to even talk intelligently about this from a technical standpoint.

The end result is called a "kit," and you can download the kit (which is free) and use the individual images for digital scrapbooking or tags. Everything I just described is either on her blog or from some emailing we did with her.

What we can talk about intelligently is our personal response to her work. When we checked out her blog, we were initially at a loss for words to describe how impressed and beautiful we thought her work was. The colors and designs are simply breathtaking.

We asked her if she would mind us writing something today about her post so others here can go check it out, and she graciously agreed.

We want to thank her for dedicating the kit to us, and really appreciate the very kind words in her dedication.

Her blog is called Angel Flowers Scraps and Other Things and the image in this post of the double hearts is from her kit. Oh, she also says on her blog that she loves M/M books and one she lists (Clear Water by Amy Lane) is very dear to my heart.

"Oh, But It's Never Too Late To Celebrate Love"

Matty and I had a wonderful time on our date Saturday night (belatedly) celebrating Valentine's Day. 

The limo Mark and John arranged for us was there on time. The driver came around to open the door for us, but Matty very subtly and politely indicated with a nod of his head that he would open the door for me. The driver then got to do his duty by closing it, once we were both inside. Matty. Always the gentleman!☺

When we arrived at the hotel, we... or rather, I... was surprised to find a photographer waiting to take our picture as we were getting out! Matty was grinning from ear to ear! I thought it was the paparazzi mistaking us for some celebrities! Matty had gotten his older brother to ask a friend of his (who is a photographer) to take a few pictures of us that night!

After we got seated in the restaurant, the photographer came over and snapped some more photos of us, then we got some more while we were eating, and then a few while we were dancing later! He was never intrusive and it didn't distract from all the love flowing across the table. But can you believe this?

We had an unbelievably delicious dinner and enjoyed some nice dancing at this fancy restaurant with all the other (older than us) people there. We were definitely the youngest diners. 

The dance music was mainly on the slow side, and even when they played something fast, it was nothing to work up any kind of sweat over, but it was still a lot of fun anyway. Nothing like slow dancing with the one you love, right?

We were getting a number of friendly stares and nods (we speculated that people thought we must be somebody important since we had that photographer taking our pictures), and one older lady, who looked like she might have been maybe in her seventies, actually got our attention by sending us her sweet smile and a little wave across the room. So sweet. 

We went over to say hello to her and her husband and introduce ourselves and when she asked us how old we were, you would have thought we were her favorite grandchildren she hadn't seen in a long time. I even (swear to God) got my cheek pinched! ☺

We chatted with them for just a short while and I told them we were celebrating a late Valentine's Day. The lady sorta tilted her head slightly and grinned and said, "Oh, but it's never too late to celebrate your love."

Two couples actually stopped by our table to say hello. One couple said they enjoyed watching us dance together, and the lady in another couple said we were (in her words), "Just adorable." The man with her had a big smile on his face and they introduced themselves, so there were handshakes all around.

We had a nice time in the limo on the ride home, which we'll tell you more about later. Let's just say for now that on the ride home we went from "just adorable" to something along the lines of "just loving." That ride home just about "blew me" away! {evil grin}

Oh, I almost forgot... then there was some role playing once we got home... We may have mentioned that a few days ago. LOL.

This week we're planning on sharing some of the highlights of Saturday night, and haven't decided yet whether each of us will write sometime from our own perspective, or whether we'll collaborate on something together. Stay tuned! ☺

Today is a holiday in the U.S. (Presidents' Day), so we're home from school and we're using the time to get caught up on lots of various chores, grocery shopping, laundry, etc., in addition to recovering from a wonderful Saturday night! One we'll always have memories about.

Video: A Dream About Equal Love

The Italian gay rights group, Arcigay, has released a video whose message needs no translation.

In it, a gay couple is able to stand before supportive friends and family and get married. But the video is more of a dream because Italy doesn't recognize any form of same-sex partnership, nevermind marriage.

It's a beautiful video nevertheless. Neither of us knows Italian, but you don't really need to know the words to the background song to see how beautiful this really is.

Romantic Dinner, Some Red Things, & Sex Role Play

Since we spent Valentine's Day with two of our very special friends, Matty wanted to do something really special for just the two of us. He asked me out on a date (I love that we still go out on dates). He made reservations for dinner at one of the fancy-schmancy hotel restaurants in downtown Boston for Saturday night.

It's one of those hotels where you have to wear a suit to get within 50 yards of the hotel entrance, and it's where the President and celebrities often stay when they're in Boston overnight. The restaurant obviously has a dress code so Matty has to leave his sneakers and Red Sox cap at home, which he's (reluctantly) agreed to do!

And we just found out that our friends, Mark and John, want to contribute to this slightly-delayed Valentine's Day celebration! They both chipped in and arranged for us to have a stretch limo arrive at our house to take us to the hotel restaurant and return us home! Can you believe that?

When I was thinking about dressing up for the evening, I thought it would be cute for both of us to wear red ties, or ties that had red as the dominant color. You know, since this was our special Valentine's Day celebration. Matty thought it would be a little over the top and said his Red Sox cap had red in it, and why couldn't he wear that instead. I was not amused, though he was amused that I was not amused!

He agreed, of course, to leave the baseball cap at home and called his brother to borrow a tie that has some red in it. I was going to pick up a solid red tie for myself, but then K.Z. Snow left a comment on yesterday's post and suggested a bow tie. Well, I've never worn a bow tie before, but I love the idea. So guess what, K.Z.? I'm getting a red bow tie to wear! But I'll have on more clothes than this dude--------->

I also wanted both of us to wear a small red rose boutonniere, which I'm still trying to talk Matty into. I mean, this is a special occasion and I like the idea of a red rose, which is a universal symbol of love. Even more than a red tie, red bow tie, or Red Sox cap! Right?

So Matty came up with the idea of buying just me a red rose boutonniere to wear and said it would be his private and secret way of "marking" me as his.

I'm still thinking about this, but there's something incredibly sexy and hot about his wanting me "marked" as belonging to him. Silly, maybe, but it's kind of a hot, sexy idea that gets me turned on.

It would be something just the two of us would know about, and I guess I'd be sitting there feeling all special. And it was Matty's idea. I figure since I came up with the idea of wearing red ties, he could get to pick how he wanted to "mark" me as belonging to him.

So here's where we'd like your help and suggestions. When we get home from dinner, we want to have some kind of hot erotic sexual role play. Sometimes we like to think up different role plays when we have sex. It's incredibly sexy to step out of our usual ways of making love and come up with some different sexual "scenes" to add a little spice to things. We've had some of our hottest sex when we role played different scenarios.

You can only imagine what we did for Halloween. You might remember I played Little Red Riding Hood (hmmm, there's that color "red" again!), and Matty played the Big Bad Wolf, all growly and full of animal passion! Whew!

We want to think of something really different this Saturday night and we want to use some of the themes we're discussing here. For example, Matty gets to pretend he's a Red Sox baseball player (where he gets to finally wear his baseball cap) and I could be the Bat Boy. He's always said he likes my "bat and balls," so that might work!

Or maybe we could go a little slutty and pretend we're still in that fancy hotel where we had dinner. He could again pretend to be some famous baseball player, or a porn star visiting Boston, and he could call for room service, and moi could arrive bringing him some delicious "dessert" from the kitchen (and since I'm planning on being a chef, that might be fun for me). Or he could call for a Rent Boy (moi) or I could be the hotel "Special Services Erotic Masseuse." Get the idea?

So, what do you think? Help us with ideas for some really different sexual role plays that may not be what you would call "standard" ones. All the erotic trappings you can think of thrown in. Or even something simple that would be erotically high-charged.

We need your help, and hope you have a little fun coming up with some ideas. You can contribute one idea, or as many as you like. We might even have a little fun picking and choosing from different ones! 

And we might even tell you next week what we did, if you ask nicely!

A Special Night

Matty and I had a wonderful time celebrating Valentine's Day with our two very special friends, Mark and John. It was fun cooking dinner for them and seeing them feel cared for. They deserve a much better life than they got growing up.

One way I have of showing my love is through my cooking. I've mentioned before that I plan to go to culinary school, but I want that basic college degree first. I think about college being about all these different "meal courses" and culinary school as being the "dessert" waiting for me at the end.

Matty said he wanted me to show you the menu I prepared last night, so if you'll allow me this little bit of bragging, here's what I made:

Your basic simple tossed salad.

French onion soup.
Pineapple and Soy-Glazed Salmon.
Ricotta mashed potatoes
Green beans with cherry tomatoes.
Sweet baby carrots.
Chocolate covered strawberries.

Everybody said they thought it turned out well, but for me the best part was the planning, the cooking, and then seeing everybody enjoy it. I had some candles on the table, the lighting was dimmed and we had some really nice, relaxing music in the background.

The conversation we had was also very special. Mark and John caught us up on how things are going with them and we also did some joking around about how we want to be the first to know when they set a wedding date. I think that sorta made them blush since they've only been dating since Thanksgiving. Matty did make them promise that both of us could be their Best Men if it ever happened.

Stay tuned for news about the special celebration Matty has planned for the two of us. We both wanted to share Valentine's Day with our two friends, but Matty asked me out this weekend for something really, really special. Just the two of us. All I can say right now is that it involves a red tie and a red rose. I'll probably post about it tomorrow. Hope everyone had a nice day yesterday.

Valentine's Day: To Mark & John, Our Special Friends

Happy Valentine's Day

to
Mark & John

Two Very Special Friends

We wanted to do something a little different to celebrate Valentine's Day this year.

You may remember from something we wrote around Thanksgiving that we invited 2 very dear friends of ours to spend the holiday with us.

I invited my friend Mark and Brad invited his friend John. Neither had met each other before that day.

Mark had been kicked out of his parent's house when he was 16 when he told his parents he was gay. He's also dated a few guys in the past who treated him badly and is understandably careful about how much he opens himself up to people.

John's parents have always been heavy drinkers and chaos was the norm in his family. He also had a pretty strained relationship since coming out as gay.

They had never met each other before and since neither of them had any plans for Thanksgiving, we invited them over here.

Well, they seemed to immediately hit it off with each other and shortly began dating. They've been together ever since.

It makes us feel so good to see them happy and they remind the two of us how precious love is. They're learning how to open up to each other after coming from families where that could be dangerous.

And the most precious gift they've given us is their trust when they ask our advice on how to deal with different issues that come up for them sometimes.

So on this Valentine's Day, we invited them over for dinner tonight and we're going to be treated by something delicious from Chef Bradley's kitchen.

So, HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY, Mark & John. We want to celebrate your love today and thank you for the gift of your friendship.

Hope everyone enjoys the day, whether you're spending it with the one you love or with people you care about and who care about you.

Video: 20 Things We Love About Each Other

No, this is not us.

There's something kinda sweet and adorable about these two guys we found on YouTube. They're talking off the top of their head about 20 things they love about each other. With Valentine's Day almost here, we thought you might enjoy it. The guy in the black shirt is our favorite. And he has a beautiful smile.

Matty's Guest Post About Non-Traditional MM Heroes

Now it's Matty's turn over at the Chicks 'n Dicks blog.

He's written a Guest Post on First Encounters and Lasting Impressions where he talks about some of his first encounters with M/M romance books in high school. Then he shares what kind of Heroes he looks for now, and mentions an especially important book that's made a lasting impression on him.

I got to read the whole thing before he sent it in, except for what he wrote right under the title. He only showed that to me last night. When you see it you'll understand why we went to bed early, but, well... didn't get much sleep.

Our Guest Post About Non-Traditional M/M Heroes

If you head over to Chicks 'n Dicks, you'll find a Guest Post written by our very own Brad.

On Thursday, my post will go up.

Their topic for the entire month of February is:

The Non-Traditional Hero

in M/M Fiction

So, drop on by Chicks 'n Dicks and see what we think about Non-Traditional M/M heroes. 

This is the very first time we've ever done a guest post on another blog, and we want to thank Anne Tenino for inviting us. Thanks to this invitation, we're no longer virgins, that is, "virgin guest post bloggers"!

Hope you enjoy!

Writing for Another Blog

We were both asked last week if each of us would be interested in writing a Guest Post for another blog and we spent a good portion of the weekend working on those. It's funny how writing posts for our own blog seem a lot easier than writing one for somebody else's blog.

It's sorta like you've been invited to a dinner party at someone else's house, someone you don't know all that well and you want to make sure you make a good impression.

You definitely want to wear the right clothes, make sure your hair looks okay, and you won't be too nervous making the necessary small talk until you get to know them better and can relax.

And, of course, what if you run into somebody at the dinner party and they're really, really smart and they try to talk to you about astrophysics or whether mathematics was invented or discovered?

This is just an over exaggeration of course. The person at the blog we're writing for is super nice and was extremely helpful in making suggestions for topics and answered all our questions and made us feel relaxed and welcomed.

Guess you can tell we're "a little" nervous about stepping out of familiar territory. But then again, that's a big part of what growing up is all about, right?

We're both actually excited about what we've written. As soon as we find out the date they're going up, we'll post something here with directions on how to find the "dinner party" where we'll be. We'd appreciate it, however, if you don't ask us about astrophysics, please. Thank you. ;)

We Made the List (Sorta)!

Matty and I are taking some time today and this weekend to work on a couple of guest posts we're writing for another blog (more details to follow later).

So we just wanted to put up a little bragging for you to (hopefully) enjoy. And we'd like to ask a question we need help with. The question is at the end and you have to read the post to understand what we're asking.

Advocate.com recently did a totally subjective study of different cities in the U.S. to determine the Gayest Cities in America. Here's the formula they used to determine these honors:

Even though we don't technically live inside the city limits of Boston or Cambridge (we're in one of the surrounding suburbs), we consider ourselves Honorary Bostonians and Honorary Cantabrigians. (Huh? That's right. A resident of Cambridge is called a Cantabrigian! Check it out: Merriam-Webster.com)

Cambridge, Massachusetts came in NUMBER 3!

3. Cambridge, Mass.The home of Harvard University likes a smarty-pants, including the nation’s first African-American lesbian mayor, E. Denise Simmons. Though her reign ended in 2009, she is currently in her sixth term on the City Council, which enacted antidiscrimination protections for transgender people in 1997. The town’s Paradise bar (ParadiseCambridge.com) is billed as New England’s only gay club with hot male dancers six nights a week — hey, everyone needs a night off — and the town is right next to a little hamlet named Boston, where allegedly LGBT stuff sometimes happens too.

---

(We want to find that club "...with hot male dancers six nights a week.")

Boston got an Honorable Mention at a pitiful number 24, but at least made the list. The suburb we're in was nowhere on the list! LOL. 


So our question is this: What are some ideas you have about what the two of us can do to get our suburb on this list next year? Matty says we ought to be two of those "hot male dancers" right here in our neighborhood. (!) Or maybe have Speedo Night. He says, "We can't let Cambridge and Boston have all the fun!" Good grief.

Hope everyone has a nice weekend!

Another State Allows Marriage for Same-Sex Couples!

The Legislature in the State of Washington is scheduled to pass a Marriage Equality Bill today and the Governor is planning to sign it. The State Senate passed the bill yesterday and the House of Representatives has apparently already passed the same bill. They need to take one more vote so the Bill will be officially considered a single piece of legislation for the Governor to sign.

The State of Washington will be the SEVENTH state plus the District of Columbia to extend equal marriage rights for same-sex couples!

I'm proud to live in the first state in the U.S. (Massachusetts) to allow same-sex couples to marry. This was on May 17, 2004.

Many of you have probably already seen this, but I want to post this video again to celebrate. After we posted the video this past summer, we got an email from the "producer/writer/star" thanking us for sharing this (gay) version of Lady Gaga's song, The Edge of Glory, and we've reprinted the email he sent us below.

Name*:Jason O'Ffill
Email*:rebelwthcause@gmail.com
Subject:The (Gay) Edge of Glory
Message*:Hello All,

My name is Jason O’Ffill. I am the producer/writer/star of “The (Gay) Edge of Glory”. I wanted to personally say thank you to you, for being among the first people to not only post the video; but blog about it as well. It really means the world. In three weeks we have reached 270,000 views. And in all honesty I could never have done it without your help.

The main reason I am writing to you today is, well, I want to really push the video. I have gotten letters from around the world, as far as China and close as Nebraska. All from young people, old people, people. Telling me how a single video showed them that love is amazing. They want to be married. And in a lot of cases, it helped them realize it was okay to be gay.

I want to break the walls we have set up and show the youth of the world that it is okay to be who you are. Cause in the end that is what is important. And while not everyone in this world, gay or straight; wants to be married. We all want to be loved. A basic human need. The positive feeling the video has evoked I want to keep providing. And pushing. If you can help me with this I would greatly appreciate it.

My focus was changed by the responses that I got. And now I want to push the idea that who you are is what you love. At the end of the day, the gym bodies, the clothing, the cars, that will all fade away. What is left is the person. The heart. The soul. That is what is important. That is the edge of glory.

People ask what is real in the video, what is not. It is ALL real for the people that desire it to be. There is a lot of truth on that screen. Let’s continue to show it. The Link is http://youtu.be/be9w4QpQ4Xw.. Please repost it, blog it, link it, Facebook it, tweet it. Let’s send a message. If we can change even one heart we can change the world. We are giving youth hope. Let’s not stop now.

With full thanks, and best regards,

Jason O’Ffill

Book Recommendation: Something Like Summer

First the blurb, then my thoughts:

Love, like everything in the universe, cannot be destroyed. But over time it can change.

The hot Texas nights were lonely for Ben before his heart began beating to the rhythm of two words: Tim Wyman. By all appearances, Tim had the perfect body and ideal life, but when a not-so-accidental collision brings them together, Ben discovers that the truth is rarely so simple. If winning Tim’s heart was an impossible quest, keeping it would prove even harder as family, society, and emotion threaten to tear them apart.

Something Like Summer is a love story spanning a decade and beyond as two boys discover what it means to be friends, lovers, and sometimes even enemies.
Here's what I thought:
 I made the mistake of finishing this book when I was in the campus library last semester. When I say "mistake" I'm referring to how I was all over the place emotionally after reading the last few pages.

That's not necessarily a bad thing for me when I read a book that has a meaningful story to tell. It was just that I had a class to go to next and I knew it was going to be difficult for me to concentrate since I wanted to think about the story and try and sort through all my feelings. It was one of those times I wish I had somebody to talk to about the book. Instead, I was headed to my calculus class, where I knew I'd have to get super-focused on numbers and calculations! Uggghhhhh!

The plot was not always predictable, and I think that made the storyline that much better. While I was reading it, I felt all kinds of things... sometimes I would laugh out loud, then get really sad, then start cheering, then get really mad, then I'd be sitting on the edge of my chair...

I thought the characters were well written and I had all kinds of feelings about each one of them. At the end of the story I still had some reservations about one of the characters (Tim), but I really like books like this where I don't necessarily like every single person because, as in this case, I think it makes the story have more depth.

This book really sold me on the author's ability to write good characters, good plot with lots of twists and turns, and an ending I was not expecting.

We end up with a HEA ending, but for a while I wasn't sure that's where it was headed. I think Tim, the character I had a hard time liking, loved Ben all along, but something was going on inside him all the way through, some kind of issue about whether he was gay or not.

At the end I wanted to shout at Ben something like, "Please be careful. Give it some time and keep your eyes open." I just felt so protective of Ben. I do think Ben had a good head on his shoulders, so I don't know why I felt so protective.

Endings like this, where any number of things could play out, always make the reading more interesting to me. It's like I have to think more after the last page, so in my head the story stays alive, if that makes sense.

Definitely a book I'm going to reread.

And now there's word from the author's website that Something Like Summer is being made into a movie. Can't wait to see it.

Here's a link to Jessewave where there's an interview with the author about the movie.