more pride pics

some pictures from the pride festival in san diego

A Picture Share!

Greetings from SD gay pride

if he grows into those ears...

A Picture Share!

A Picture Share!

sweet kitty

Elvis (El Diablo Negro)

Elvis prefers the high ground.

Chee Chee Club in Downtown San Diego 8am

April 4, 2002

I have to transfer buses downtown and cross Broadway at 9th Avenue to catch my connecting bus on my way home from work. The stop is directly in front of the "World Famous Chee Chee Club". That is the full name, but the pink neon sign out front just says Chee Chee. It sounds like an oriental meditative exercise, but it isn’t. It is really something less spiritual but equally soothing. It is a seedy after-hours bar in downtown San Diego. A bar that closes only briefly in the early morning, and is back in business at 6 a.m. One can find a Pabst, a transvestite, some crank, or a crack rock inside the Chee Chee, any time of day. It is 7:15 a.m. on a sunny Sunday morning.

So, here I come jaywalking across the street, trying not to look very stupid in the big puffy pirate shirt and baby-shit-brown polyester slacks that make up my front desk uniform. I am failing. Since I am a heavy smoker and drinker (and famous glutton), and because there is another bus coming, I am fairly out of breath as I approach the curb in front of the Chee Chee. I am panting and twisting around, fumbling with my back-pack for my cigarettes when this very drunk 300 lb Polynesian woman looks up at me from the bench and says,

"Hey Baaaaaaaaaby!"
I figure I know her from somewhere. Maybe she's a drag queen friend of a former roommate. Maybe we went to High School together. Maybe she's there everyday and I've never noticed her. Since the 929 is bearing down on me pretty quickly, I reply (in a significantly less enthusiastic tone),
"Hey Baby."

I make it across Broadway in time to avoid the Airport Shuttle. Miss Thing then proceeds to ask me for a cigarette, which I still can't find because they are being crushed under this fabulous book I’m reading called The Years of Rice and Salt by Kim Stanley-Robinson. I rescue the damned things and am opening them up when she asks,

"Can I come home with you?"

I hand her one of my last three cigarettes (even though she has a lit one hanging out of the corner of her mouth) and say,

"Well, I'm on my way to work."

She puts my cigarette behind her ear and replies,

"Oh."
Of course, during this entire exchange I am looking frantically for my bus. It does not appear around the corner, despite several quickly improvised prayers...

o’ holy mother of commuters, pray for us now and at the hour of our transfer...

"It's a shame you have to go to work," she slurs around her cigarette, "cause I'd sure like to lick your balls." Even she doesn't sound convinced. The best reply I can muster is,

"I don't think my boyfriend would like that."

She is not impressed. Without a moment's pause, she fires back,

"I don't care what your boyfriend likes, I just want to lick 'em."

Since my Mama brought me up right, I utter what I can only hope is the most polite response.

"Well...thank you."

"No problem."

She offers me a beautiful, sunny smile, and my bus pulls up. I get on the #7 as she is rummaging in the mass of hair behind her left ear, looking for the smoke I'd given her. By the time I find an empty seat and the bus begins to pull away from the curb, she has it lit.

The next time you're in San Diego, we are going to the Chee Chee!

Why I moved to Tijuana

People often ask me why I moved to TJ, the following was written about this time last year...

I am living in a 49 square foot “loft” hotel room in the Hillcrest neighborhood of San Diego. I am paying about $240 a week because it is the only flop-house of it’s kind in the area that accepts pets. An unexpected side effect of this tolerant policy is an above average clientele. I love it.

Ok. I don’t love it. But I love San Diego and the rent includes cable plus Home Box Office. My cats love the fact that the “bedroom” consists of a full size foam mattress on a rickety shelf above the bathroom. The seven foot by seven foot pit of a room is bisected by the wooden folding attic staircase that is the only access to the foam mattress. I have rigged a shelf with a piece of particle board I found out back. The shelf sits upon a spider web of mismatched two-by-fours. The base of the attic staircase is suspended from this splintery web by tarnished tin joints, each with yellowed plastic stickers stating “URGENT: Drive nails through bracket holes to secure staircase.” None of the bracket holes have nails driven through them. My poor cats scamper around in the questionable infrastructure of my “loft” with careless abandon. My heart is always in my mouth.

I am not a petite flower. In fact, I have a big fat ass. So I ascend and descend the staircase with the brisk efficiency of all the insecure big girls that have ever lived, prepared for the worst and rarely disappointed. I always manage to collapse into the foam mattress without undo harm to myself or others (well, I may have inflicted some psychological harm unto others along the way . . . c’est la vie), and Bad Cat #2 is still limping.

How did I get here? I think I suffer from a common gay malady. It is a form of financial illiteracy . . . a sort of numerical dyslexia . . . an odd condition that always seems to end with me being broke and with no place to sleep. I’ll call it “Bitch can’t budget” syndrome. Fortunately tonight, I have my rickety loft. Good night, San Diego. Good night, America. July 2nd, 2004.

A Picture Share!

A Picture Share!

A Picture Share!

Memories of 1968

Found this old, old pic of me and my Father and two kittens, Good Cat and Bad Cat who remind me of my Mexican roof kitty...

gratuitous cuteness (sue me)...

Gratuitious Cuteness from my newley discoverd breed of cat: The Tijuanese (Or Mexican Roof Cat) Genetically superior to domestic cats due to generations of living wild on the roofs of Tijuana. Elvis (or "E", or simply "The King") poses for your enjoyment.

Long line to cross back to the U.S.A. yesterday, but there was entertainment.

In the kitchen.

Sunrise at work

These were taken from the front porch of the hotel where I work. The first is from this morning and the second is on a morning about a year ago when much of the country was on fire.