The City By The Gay

Just for the record, when I first moved to New York City, I was hired at a company that worked on the redevelopment strategy turning The Nashville Network into Spike TV. And in between, it was our beautiful missing link The National Network (aka The New TNN). And there, I toiled away writing hilarious puns about Pamela Anderson on Baywatch (“Double Vision”) and Star Trek: The Next Generation (“Set Your Phasers On Fun”) that populated the website. So I would like to take credit for the current passion for puns in everything from The Daily Show to Morning Joe, even though a pun is truly the lowest form of comedy. So don’t think for a minute that my pun headlines are a riff on current popular culture. I am just reusing bits I did eleven years ago. And they were no fresher then than they are now, my friend.

On the subject of the good old days, my ex-boyfriend Curtis is in town. Years and years and years ago, I spied him across Revolver and bravely gave him my number as he was leaving and then he didn’t call. For three years. But eventually he was moving a desk and found my number which had fallen behind it and finally picked up the phone. As it happens, the number I gave him was for my friend Paul's apartment where I had been staying temporarily at that time and purely by happenstance was back there, sitting waiting for Paul to get out of the shower, the night Curtis deigned to call me back and I happened to answer the phone. Please note: if I am close friends with someone, I will wash their dishes if bored, answer their phone when they are in the shower, or sort through their mail even if they are standing right there, so if you value your privacy or personal space, it is probably not a good idea to be my close friend.

The Blue Folder

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A Head In Search Of A Hairstyle

New York City itself is an act of faith. I know that sneering Fox News pundits (New York residents all, by the way) love to deride the People’s Republic of Manhattan as a Godless island floating in a sea of filth, but I would argue that its very daily existence is based on faith. I am reminded of the story of the tourist approaching a New Yorker waiting on a subway platform. “When does the train arrive?”

“Eventually.”

The tourist is incredulous. “But what if it never comes?”

“It always comes eventually.” And it does.

As the title suggests, I am a head in search of a hairstyle. For several months now, I have been growing my hair out with the idea that I will finally break down and have a real hairstyle. Tom Ford’s A Single Man was luscious and inspired me to get Nick Hoult’s dreamy shag bangs though it would require me to flat iron my luxuriously thick hair to duplicate it. Lately, I have been leaning toward keeping it long like Matt Bomer’s hair on “White Collar.” But maybe I just want Matt Bomer or Nick Hoult and not so much their hair.

But as my hair grows out, I resemble more and more a mad scientist when I struggle out of bed in the afternoon. It is not pretty or as my roommate suggested the other day: “Whatever it is you are doing with your hair, it isn’t working.” And today, it really, really wasn’t working. I briefly tried to split it down the middle and deliver a straight up early 80s feathered center part that would have looked very comfortable on a ride along with Larry Wilcox on CHiPs. When that collapsed in disaster, I doused it and the idea of it with cold water and pulled the bangs up and away from my face in what I hoped would be a romantic wave and ended up being more sea foam than a surfer’s dream curl.

As much as I would have liked to have used my hair as an excuse not to go out to Brooklyn, today is Ben Harvey's birthday. And so, like the good friend I pretend to be, I trotted down to Dumbo intent on only staying for thirty minutes. “I will drop my coat at coat check, buy Ben Harvey a drink (didn’t happen), and then pick up my coat and go.” I tell myself the sweetest lies. Not only did I not buy Ben a drink on his birthday, I stayed much longer than thirty minutes. And I didn’t even get to say hello to Dave Rubin. But I did get to spend plenty of quality time with Matty, who dragged me away to sign a birthday card. As a writer, nothing fills me with more panic than trying to be witty in a birthday card. Signing my book to people is just as creatively paralyzing. “The best of the best,” I scribbled incomprehensibly, in every sense, and then signed just my first name.

“You have to put your last name,” Matty was adamant. “No one can tell what you wrote. You can’t even see the D in your name.”

I traced in the D as best I could and wrote my last name in my best doctor’s handwriting and Matty ran off, leaving me standing next to Chris and Cub. Chris and Cub, you may have noticed are never really separated in my blog because they are never really separated in real life. They are the only couple I know who always stand together at parties. I am pleased that I know them now well enough to know their unspoken signals. While I was rambling on about something that Cub was very excited about, Chris gently ran his hand up the small of Cub’s back. I knew what that meant. “Figure skating. Get your coat.” He might have actually run his finger in a figure eight for all I know, but Cub was blocking my view.

But before they left, Cub ran to the bathroom and Chris passed me off like a tray of appetizers to Adam, originally from DC who was nearby. Adam had been talking to Ben when we walked over and since Ben was saying good bye to Chris I made what I thought was cute small talk with Adam about us being in an alphabetical circle. “Adam, Ben, Chris, Derek,” I said pointing around. “Now all we need is an Eric and a Fred. Although knowing the gays we will just get two more guys named Chris” Well, I thought it was cute. But Adam responded “Or Cub.” I guess he missed my joke. Or maybe, as my ex-boyfriend Curtis pointed out, “Sometimes when Derek is talking, he has no idea who he is talking to.”

Adam looks like an actor whose name escapes me at the moment. At first, I thought I knew him. I wonder who he chose for doppelganger week on Facebook. Maybe that will help me figure it out. I suppose it is possible that we have met before. We do all run in the same concentric circles. And after a while, all gay men look alike. The factory just keeps churning them out. Only the hair and the clothes change.

Even though Matty told me tonight that I look younger and thinner than ever, we all suffer the fate of the law of diminishing returns. Seeing the same gay guys over and over again can give you a repetitive stress disorder. Trying to figure out what to do with my hair has been a forty year journey, I could just as soon do without. And speaking of forty, Andrew, who it should be noted is 22 years old, told me tonight that he doesn’t worry at all about turning forty. “I don’t fear death, why should I fear forty?”

I gently put my hand on his young, firm shoulder and gazed into his eyes through those patented Nick Hoult dreamy shag bangs of his and said, “The difference between forty and death is simple. Death is like losing your keys somewhere in your house. You know they are there somewhere and you’ll find them when you least expect it. Forty is losing your keys in the toilet. You know exactly where they are and how much it’s going to suck retrieving them.”

Adam left without saying good bye. Even though when he told me he used to teach at Georgetown, I said, “I’ve heard of that school. It comes up a lot on Jeopardy. Mostly on college week.” And my personal best, “I’ve been to every continent except South America.” To which he replied, as I hoped he would, “What about Antarctica?” I smiled, “I was there for the white party three years ago. Everyone in white parkas. It was amazing.” It made me happy that he knew Antarctica was a continent, but more importantly, I think the white party joke would have been awkward if he had said Africa, don’t you? Of course I still would have told it. But maybe it was all awkward and only in my head was I both hilarious and charming with beautiful luxurious hair.

“Go after him!” Matty demanded but I stayed put. New York City is about faith, after all. Even though Adam misheard my name as “Pierre” when I met him, if he wants to find me again, he will. Just like my hair. I will figure out a style for it one of these days. And in the meantime, it will just keep growing anyway. I don’t have to do a thing. After I left the party, I hurried down to the subway platform, just to watch the F train depart for Manhattan without me. I was worried about the time because I didn’t leave myself much of a margin of error to get to Grand Central Station for the final leg of my journey home. But I thought about the tourist and the New Yorker on the platform and I realized the train would come when it comes. And just like that, there was a New York miracle. A second F train right behind the first. All you need is a little faith in this town and everything works out the way it should.

Eventually.

Unwanted Attention

"This would be a great place for a party." I said in the Rouge Room in the basement of Paris Commune, a chic eatery in lower Manhattan. It would have been a bold suggestion if we weren't already there attending someone else's party. A self-centered asshole like me takes the unspoken "for me" at the end of every statement like that as a given but to casual listeners like Ben Harvey and Navy Man Joe it just came off as a little daft. Sadly, when it comes to words, I work in a volume business and that means the finer points get lost in the rush, which is something of a problem.

Things started out well enough at Rocking Horse, a cozy restaurant in Chelsea where Matty and I finally were able to corner Ronnie and plot his future. I am, by nature, a meddlesome and nosy person, which drives Roommate to distraction as I dissect the personal lives of our neighbors while driving down the street with comments like "I wish Jennifer would sell that house of hers" and "I love her yard. She can't possibly hold down a job and spend so much time landscaping." Matty, as I have often posted, is the most connected person I know. Working in tandem we are like Wonder Twins, swooping down into the lives of the unsuspecting and molding their future like so much modeling clay. In Ronnie, we see a modern day Galatea, already armed with ambition, just waiting to be thrust in the right direction.

Ronnie swilled coffee like an overnight truck driver, worn out from his long and productive weekend in DC with the NGLCC, joining us for dinner direct from the airport, overnight bag in hand. Matty's handsome boyfriend Hanno and Ben Harvey rounded out our fivesome and we had a great time over margaritas and barely recognizable "Mexican" food. "What did you order?" asked Matty, gazing down at what appeared to be a very unappetizing pile of diarrhea in front of me. It was what turned out to be a very delicious hunk of pork on a bed of mashed plantains, but I must confess it did look suspiciously like something a plumber would pull out of a clogged drain.

After dinner, Ronnie raced home to his bed for what I assume was 12 hours of uninterrupted sleep, and Matty piped us down to the West Village for the birthday party of a friend whose name I instantly forgot. The friend was very sweet and fun, and all of his gay friends were pretty and diverse, like the Justice Department forcing A&F to acquire the United Colors of Benetton. Since they hadn't finished eating at the long Captain's table in the basement wine bar, we settled into polite conversation at a quiet table in the corner, and not so long after was joined by Joe, last seen stumbling home from Halloween.

In a self-referential move that would make Charlie Kaufman proud, talk quickly turned to this blog and the damage it has wrought since I started it almost two years ago. "Every time you write in your blog, someone gets hurt!" Matty chided me, not amused that his name and "ass eating" ended up in the same sentence last time, even though Bradford's blog is the first Google search result that comes up when you type them in together (should any weirdo ever want to make such a search). Joe was perfectly happy with his entry and his friends, upon discovering it, expressed their joy at sudden blog infamy, but Matty is right. My blog, despite my intentions to only portray things the way I see them and paint myself in a worse light than anyone else, often backfires. I have inadvertently outed people that I assumed were out and no doubt have made untold enemies along the way. I wouldn't have written about election night at all except that Hanno mentioned that night that his friends back in Osterreich liked the first entry he was in. Apparently, it is true that no good deed goes unpunished, or in this case, misinterpreted.

After a round of intense picture taking, Matty and Hanno headed home, and Ben and I left as well with every intention (emphasis added) to head straight home ourselves. We left Joe behind with a full glass of wine, and half-empty birthday party as well as charge over Matty's forgotten umbrella. Walking up eighth avenue, Ben suddenly got a text from Martin, whom he had forgotten he told to join us at Paris Commune. Martin said he was on his way there and in a moment of guilty panic we both decided not to snub Martin and meet him for a quick single drink at Barracuda. Immediately we thought we should invite Joe since we so hastily retreated from the last party but neither of us had his number. A modern gay Kobayashi Maru if ever there was one.

Barracuda smelled like the quite literal bowels of Hell but it was packed to the rafters anyway. Adorable Ryan Newman was there, showing off his sensational new short haircut. I wanted to go catch up with him, but while waiting for Martin to arrive, Ben mistakenly made casual eye contact with a deranged stranger in a houndstooth jacket. For the rest of my time there, we actively pivoted away from him only to have him counter our every move. Check. Check. Check. Then after Martin joined us and headed up to the bar to get a drink, it was Checkmate when he cornered Martin who was waiting helplessly for his cocktail. That was the end of the line for me. I had only stayed long enough to protect Ben from the clutches of this dubious letch, having failed at that, the drunk train awaited.

There is so much left unsaid out of an evening on the town. I leave many of the best scraps on the floor and sweep them out of my memory because I like my friends and I don't want to engender even more resentment. I am already someone that can be difficult to like and as Curtis once observed, "Sometimes when Derek is talking, it seems like he has no idea who he is talking to." In the case of this blog, the only person I am really talking to is myself. True, other people are able to listen, and I try to be mindful of that. But life is what it is. Sometimes it isn't pretty. And when you only have a few paragraphs to work with, you can see clearly that the Reader's Digest version of my life strips a lot of cartilage off the bone. And that can lead to some very painful moments as we move through everyday life.

Keeping Things Fresh!

I have a terrible problem with alcohol. If I drink a lot and pass out, I wake up four hours later feeling completely refreshed and ready to go again. This is how casual drinkers turn into raging alcoholics. It is also fun and easy to do when you are 22 and working full-time in a drug clinic, but a decade and a half later, your body and mind may bounce back quickly, but your face tells the story of the long night before. It isn't pretty and neither are you.

Sunday morning, after not sleeping for two days because of the travel to San Francisco, I woke up bright and early at 7:30am. And could not get back to sleep. I watched some TV (thank you Chris Matthews), looked online for an obscure song from a movie and answered some emails, but mostly I just lolled around in the massive bed in my suite at the W Hotel. The night before, I had hosted the GayVN awards along with Romaine and Lady Bunny. Romaine was already on a plane back home to her baby and Bunny I suspected was nothing but a pile of shredded pantyhose and smeared mascara at that hour. I wandered out to the local Starbucks for my usual iced venti chai and a little wedge of banana nut bread to fill my stomach. During my early morning meditation, I pulled together brunch with my ex-boyfriend Curtis and my former intern Bobby (aka Bobby Intern I), both of whom I knew in other cities but who live in SF now.

I tried to nap a little bit before our 12:30pm brunch, but failing at that, I soaked in the tub for a while, and then pulled myself together as best I could. I ran into Bunny in the lobby on my way out. She had some time to kill before her flight and planned to check out some weird museum show that was going on. I only half understood what she was saying because my mind kept wandering to my own childhood visits to the museums of San Francisco, including the legendary exploratorium, during the brief time (known as the 1970s) when you could experience it's tactile dome naked if you so chose. Yes, Virginia, even San Francisco has gotten more conservative over the years.

Initially we were going to meet at Lime On Market for brunch but there was a 150 person waiting list and the blank stare from the hostest when Curtis tried (at my urging) to pull a "don't you know who he thinks he is" told us we should look somewhere else if we wanted to eat that day. I was relieved. The place was a big gay scene, the likes of which I thought San Francisco railed again, and even though I am deaf as a post thanks to a childhood obsession with the SONY Walkman and years working in radio, the place was just too loud for me. The three of us ended up settling at 2223, which was delightful. The bloody mary was the size of Mt. Everest (though much easier to climb) and the cinammon bun we all shared made me sorry Romaine had left so early.

Brunch with Curtis and Bobby was so pleasant. By way of introduction, they both told each other stories about me, which anyone who knows me knows could keep me entertained all afternoon long. In between they talked about gay life in San Francisco, other places to see and be seen, and other topics of no interest to me whatsoever. I did tell Bobby that I had been invited by John Rutherford to join him later that night at a party honoring our friend Jack Mackenroth of Project Runway. Bobby really wanted to meet John and coincidentally he had already planned to be at Fresh, the club where the party was taking place. We endeavored to meet up at the party later.

I walked back to the hotel, stuffed to the gills and hoping the walk would both relieve the bloated feeling and wear me out enough to take a short nap before the party that night. I looked plenty haggard at brunch, which was fine, but going to a nightclub was a whole other matter. I needed to look at least halfway human. Along the way, I bought a giant family-size bottle of Gatorade and some Mega Millions lottery tickets (Hey! You never know!) since water and the $220 million jackpot could go a long way toward looking halfway human. I sent a text message to Erik Rhodes to see if he was alive and wanted to be my plus one at the event later. The night before he had told me he wasn't leaving until Monday either and didn't really have anything to do. So I promised him I would make contact and if he wasn't dead to the world (or just plain dead) maybe we would meet up. He was still feeling the night before quite hard but I told him I would check in with him later to see if he was more ready to face the world. That was the last I heard of him.

Back at the W, I threw myself on the mercy of the bed and passed out for a delightful and restful three hour nap. Just before six pm, I got a text message from John Rutherford asking if I could be ready to go in fifteen minutes. I agreed to Name That Tune, hopped in the shower and pulled myself together. Well, the nap must have done the trick because I woke up looking more like a human being than I had earlier in the day. What a relief.

John and I found Doris Day parking just down the street from Fresh only to discover that I was not on the guest list and he didn't have a plus one. Despite having a national radio show and having been one of the earliest employees at PlanetOut, the parent company of the folks throwing the party that night, door queen had no interest in letting me in. Finally I squeezed in as Jack Mackenroth's plus one. Apparently, I wasn't the only one who got shade at the door. When Jack arrived, door queen asked him to spell his last name to see if he was on the list and he said, "Honey, it's the one on the invitation." Things picked up almost immediately for me when the bouncer asked to see my I.D. "You are just the sweetest man alive." I said as I pulled my card out of my wallet. "Ah" he said as he handed me my I.D. back, "I can see now why you said that. Have a good night." That must have been some kind of a nap I took.

Inside, the party was just getting started. I ran into Cassandra, the Gay.com publicist for the event and it turns out I had met her many times before when she was helping promote adorable Eric Himan. John Rutherford and I hung out in the VIP area (you can see his alternate take on the evening in his blog) until Jack finally arrived and then we wandered off with him to the autograph table set up for him. Jack was wedged quite unhappily by the men's room and spent most of his time there blocked by the long time of shirtless hunks waiting to do coke in the stalls. John commented on the bad placement and I reminded him of my famous adage that fame is nothing more than a series of humiliations and how famous you become depends entirely on your willingness to be humiliated at every turn. Jack didn't seem to mind as long as the money and the booze was flowing his direction.

While there John Rutherford noticed an adorable guy checking me out while waiting in line for the bathroom. I didn't believe him at first but then after considerable staring, I did notice him staring and smiling back. I waited for him to come out of the bathroom, but by the time he did Cassandra from PlanetOut was all up in my grill and he was beseiged by fag hags and then disappeared into the crowd. Once that happened, I knew it would be virtually impossible to find him again. In the meantime, another hot guy showed up in line wearing a terrible white tank top with semaphores on it. The outfit was awful but his pouty lips were Angelina Jolie worthy. I tried to get John to "discover" him for Buckshot but he didn't even have a business card on him. I offered to give him mine, but when I reached in my wallet, I realized the last of those were gone too. A couple of terrible businessmen we are!

Soon enough, John had grown weary of the party atmosphere, and I offered to walk him out since I fully intended to go to the Jack In The Box across the street when he left. He agreed that nothing sounded better than that so we both headed in that direction. Once on the sidewalk we ran into Bobby Intern arriving. Since he was starving too, the three of us decamped from the glamorous shirtless hunk party and sat down in as sketchy a fast food joint as I have ever seen for a witty conversation and a greasy stack of fries. For me, this was the perfect evening. My favorite local fast food, a bit of an alcohol buzz on and good friends. After we dispatched our meal, Bobby and I said good bye to John and then headed back to the club for more drunken adventures.

Once inside, we connected with Jack back in the VIP room and Bobby and I continued the evening that John and I had started together. While hanging out in there, suddenly the cute boy who had been checking me out earlier wandered into the VIP room. He was now sweaty from dancing and his shirt was firmly in his back pocket, but he was all smiles for me. He had spotted me from the dance floor and thought I might be able to help him get backstage so he could dance in the special area with the professional dancers. I unfortunately didn't have that power, but he settled for a kiss instead. The next thing I knew, I had him up against the wall and we were making out and grinding up on each other like it was the end of civilization. I would have been embarrassed for myself but I was just having too much fun.

Knowing that was the high water mark of the evening, and seeing how well Bobby and Jack were getting along, I figured I could head back to the hotel at a reasonable hour and try to get at least a couple of hours of sleep before my 5am trip to the airport and another 7am flight. I left Bobby and Jack and some of Jack's friends as they headed off to the next party, while I turned and walked down the hill back toward the hotel. Overall, it was a perfect night. I got carded at the door. I got to make out with a cute guy. I even danced a little with Bobby. It is true that at a certain age, some pleasures don't have the same easy delight to them that they used to have. But every once in a while, if you can pull yourself together, for a few hours in a dimly lit nightclub you can feel a little Fresh once again.

Gym Time

You know how I hate trying anything new. However, in an effort to keep myself from falling into three of my most beloved ruts, over and over and over again, I was convinced tonight to abandoned my well-worn path.

I saw a bit of Hottie Zach on Saturday at the Gay American Heroes benefit at Therapy, though most of my time was dedicated to Jonathan in the first of four increasingly adventurous adventures. I had told Zach at Therapy they we would undoubtedly end up at a bar later and he should try to meet up with us. Unfortunately for him, he got stuck fixing a shelf for his roommate and Jonathan and I stayed too long at his friend Danny's birthday party (aka adventure #4), so Zach had to be postponed to another night.

He suggested we go to Gym, a sports bar in Chelsea most notable for its high number of patrons who enjoy white wine by the glass while assiduously ignoring whatever ESPN show is playing on the many flat panel TVs. Gym is most notable to me as the place in town with some of the cheapest drinks around, which always has a place in my miserly alcoholic heart. Even though I had promised Zach some time alone, I got a last minute plea from my ex-boyfriend Curtis, who was spontaneously in town to join him out as well. Figuring the more the merrier, I invited Mike to come along too.

As I walked into the bar, the first person I spotted was not Zach, but Greg, the very straight Associate Producer of my radio show, whose own birthday party had been adventure #3 on Saturday (which culminated with Jonathan and I being thrown unceremoniously out of a notorious smoldering dump known as One Little West Twelfth). Apparently after the show, Greg, his girlfriend Dawn and their main gay Dominick were in the mood for a cheap drink. Two out of the three wanted to go to a gay bar, and one out of the three wanted to watch the game, so modern math being what it is, they ended up on bar stools at Gym.

Lately I have become obsessed with putting photos of myself on Facebook. There are only two reasons for me to go on there constantly: play Scrabulous (a dying art form) and tag/caption photos. Dawn put up a slew of photos from Greg's birthday party and I wasn't in any of them. So in an attempt to right that wrong, I asked the coat check guy to retrieve my camera from inside my already checked coat so I could make a nuisance of myself with my flash. I got some photos with Greg and company, both taken by a reasonably attractive gay guy who seemed intent on cutting everyone who wasn't me out of the group shot, reducing Dawn to a very evocative pair of bangs in the second photo. But he didn't even try to hit on me. I was no sooner done looking over the digital shots that he was out the door like a shot himself. No matter.

Hottie Zach and his sensational roommate Laurel (aka The Freak Magnet, more on that later) joined us, as did Mike and Curtis in quick succession. The gang in place, we set about doing what we do best: drinking! But first, some back story:

Curtis and I dated back in 1998-1999 when he was a fresh college grad who I had bravely bought a drink for and given my number to at Revolver. We had good times, including attending Kathy Griffin's 1998 Christmas Party (where I first absorbed the desire to make cupcakes) and harassing Carol Liefer at A' votre Sante where when she dismissed my tired line "I'm a big fan" I impressed her by repeating word for word her routine about sex with an opthomalogist. By the time I got to the punch line, "How do you like it better? Like this? Or like this?" she was beaming like a kid on Christmas morning.

Curtis lives in San Francisco now, and has made his way up through the ranks of television with impressive efficiency. I was devastated when, after only a few short months of dating, he informed me the week before Valentine's Day that he had taken a job as a News Producer in Toledo, Ohio and he was moving THAT WEEKEND. Leaving me for a job was one thing, but Toledo wasn't even a Top 50 market! I was offended. But Toledo lead to Houston which lead to San Francisco where less than a decade later, he is at the top of his game. For him, a vast improvement over his grubby apartment, cheap McDonald's hamburgers, and occasional sex with me. So much longer later, all is forgiven. He made the right choice.

While Curtis and I exchanged battle scars and quips covering the past year since we last drunkenly encountered each other at the sleazy GayVN after-party in San Francisco, Mike and Zach talked shop about military matters. All the while, several different men at the bar kept trying to nose into the conversations, mostly by practically sexually harassing Laurel. It wasn't until later that I remembered they were just trying to get to Hottie Zach through his female friend. Normally a solid move, but in this case, it just caused Laurel to instantly label them freaks, a moniker from which no sexiness can escape.

Zach and Laurel had to work in the morning, so we tried to make a reasonably early night of it. Greg and company had long since departed and the bar had thinned out like an Obama victory party in New Hampshire. It was time to go. Mike and Curtis and I left the bar, hailed a cab and headed for Grand Central Station. Once there we grabbed some food from a street vendor. Some weeks back, I had enjoyed a $4 lamb gyro there, so Mike and I decided to try to recapture the magic (it didn't) while Curtis who hadn't eaten all day, wolfed down two hot dogs.

I dashed down to the bathroom before we left and I saw someone on the floor inside one of the stalls. At first, I thought they had dropped something or that they were sick, but then I realized, no, it was just some guy getting fucked in the ass at one am in a stall at Grand Central Station. What a way to inaugurate the new East side bathrooms! I told Curtis the story on the train which lead him to tell more than one hair-raising tale of sexual adventure. I think he might have been a little disappointed by my inability to match him, story for story. What can I say? I lead an unadventurous life where I naively assume people only use bathrooms for releasing waste material, think a meal from a street vendor can be magical, and find the ruts in life a comforting sign that you are headed in the right direction.