Tuesday, April 30, 2013

Jason Collins - NBA Center Comes Out

I honestly think if Nike didn't offer a million dollar endorsement deal for a professional gay male athlete, this muthafucker would have stayed in the closet.  Did it not raise anyones eyebrow that Jason came out after already having been in the league for 12 seasons?  Of course its a good time to could come out now, his basketball career is almost over, but this timely, "coming out campaign" , could seriously reboot his stock. 

No male professional athlete would ever declare themselves as Gay in the beginning of their professional careers because of fear for not getting work. The rule of thumb for closet athletes is not to make head waves, make your money, and last as long as you can playing your sport.

I can think of a few male professional athletes who came out but not until their professional athletic careers were over - "including the NBA's John Amaechi, the NFL's Esera Tuaolo & Wade Davis and Major League Baseball's Billy Bean" . (espngo.com)

What we need are younger athletes to come out, not aged athletes with nothing to lose.

Professional soccer player Robbie Rogers recently came out but then quit his team because he didn't want to deal the pressure and politics of being a gay athlete, thats too bad because he would have made the perfect poster boy to champion this movement.

Professional Lesbian athletes are nothing new, they're actually the ones who've been pioneering the movement for a broader visibility of LGBT athletes:
  • Retired WNBA star Sheryl Swoopes, who came out in 2005 when she played for the Houston Comets. (She later married a man.)
  • Brittney Griner of the WNBA's Phoenix Mercury.
  • Chamique Holdsclaw, former WNBA player most recently with the San Antonio Silver Stars.
  • Megan Rapinoe, member of the US Women's National Team, now playing soccer professionally in France.
  • Lori Lindsey, USWNT member in the 2012 Olympics who currently plays for the Washington Spirit in the National Women's Soccer League. (motherjones.com)
Why a single professional male athlete who came out would take precedence over a bunch already out Lesbian professional athletes, thats easy, sexism, its nothing new to sports.

Its hard to say if Jason Collins coming out is money motivated but the incentive is there for sure and no matter what kind of tone any of my readers got from reading this blog, its a start.

xoxo


Saturday, April 20, 2013

Getting there

This week I met a nutritionist and learned a couple things.  I learned that I can't eat salt because thats the shit thats been leading to my high blood pressure.  So today I went shopping and bought food based on the discussions I had with the nutritionist.  On top of that, it was such a nice day I had to go for a run.

My other plus for today was that when we went to go a see a movie, instead of getting my usual junk food like nachos, a hot dog, a slerpee, or something else fattening,.I decided to go with a big bottle of water and some macadamia cookies.

And for some strange reason, when I got home from all that healthy shopping, I felt like making chocolate covered strawberries, so I watched a youtube video on how to make them and viola, they turned out great!


In other comedy news, on Thursday night I did a show for Storking Comedy in Oakland and got served.  This is what I mean, for this show, the host - OJ Patterson, does an interview with his guest after their sets and he got me good with his clever dialogue.  After my set, I was basically ranting about how even though Gay Marriage will likely pass in the U.S. Supreme Court, its going to be years before we finally start getting treated with dignity and respect from mainsteam America. 

And thats when OJ said, "are you just mad because when Gay Marriage passes you'll have no one to marry" ? *Ohhhh burn and insert applause break from the audience*

Damn that OJ, he got me good. Needless to say that was some funny ass shit.  I will admit that I have crafted many clever lines over the course of my stand up comedy career on unsuspecting audience members, so it was quite refreshing to be on the opposite end.

Heres a status update that I posted to facebook inspired by OJ's quip:

When Gay Marriage finally passes in the United States and if I have no one to marry, I will not be left standing. You guys can believe I'll be taking one of my straight guy friends to Las Vegas, put a roofie into his drink, and when he wakes up in the morning, I'm going to be smoking a cigarette, holding a marriage certificate, pointing to a ring on my finger while wearing sexy lingerie and say, "I yooouuuurrrr wife Muthaf*cker" !!!!!!

And heres a picture of the clever host himself - OJ Patterson, also check out his Bay Area Comedy Blog:

www.courtingcomedy.com









Monday, April 15, 2013

Do or Die

I just came back from the clinic and the doctor tried to put me on a low dose of high blood pressure pills, fuck that.

I'm too young to even start thinking of taking those kinds of meds so I declined.

My blood pressure was pretty high today and I'm sure the the doctor didn't take into account the reason why it was high was because I took a bike ride up the hill to deposit my check and get my brothers beer.  And then I told the doctor my schizophrenic brother made bacon this morning and didn't open the windows/doors to let the smoke out, which really irritates me when he does that.

What I didn't like was how determined the Doctor was trying to get me on meds.  I made it clear to her when my hyper-tension and anxiety was diagnosed back in December, I declined the use of the meds back then and got threw it.  And then it just seemed like whatever I said to her she just turned it around and used it against me.  I pretty sure I got matched with a bad doctor today.

The other thing I didn't like was when she said its been 3 months since my high blood pressure was diagnosed and my weight still hasn't come down.  Thats great but I didn't know I was on a timeline to get better.  And really my weight didn't start to begin skyrocketing until the end of last Summer.

She recommended to see the clinic nutritionist and I already know what they're going to say, to stop eating fast foods and drinking soda. I've stopped drinking soda again this month, so theres a plus.

I weighed in at 291, which has been the same since December.  I've been running around the lake so much I guess I've guess I've countering it with all the binge eating I've been doing afterwards.  For some reason, my brain still thinks I have the same metabolism when I was 20.

I kept telling the doctor after taking my anit-biotics this past week, I was feeling a lot better.  My breathing got better and the tightness went away.  And I said I'm sure whatever respiratory illness I was going thru, was contributing to my anxiety and hyper-tension too.

My goal for the next two months is to really watch what I eat, drink lots of water, stay on my exercising kick and lose weight.

My heart has been really good to me so now its time for me to start taking better care of my heart, I choose life.

xoxo






Sunday Night

A while back I was at Books Inc. in San Francisco and I was reading a book review about this Middle Eastern Gay guys life in Egypt. What caught my eye was how much the book reviewer enjoyed reading his book without the typical Western narrative style of analyzing everything to death.  That really hit a cord with me because thats exactly how I write, like now.  So I kept reading the critiquers review and how refreshing it was for him to read a work that didn't question its impulses or process, it just was.

So thats my goal in my blog writing for now on, I'm done with trying to figure out why some Adele song made me feel like a cooking a cheeseburger at 2:am in the morning.

Last night I felt like hitting the club to relax and to listen to some music.  My favorite place to go is Badlands in the Castro.  Its always busy on the weekends with tourist and locals alike.  I probably saw two cute white guys there.

The first one I saw was getting money out of the ATM.  He was cute, he reminded me of the whiteboy rapper - Macklemore.  He knew he was cute.  He was nice to look at but not nice enough for me to say hi.

The second cute guy of the night I saw was after the club in the late night burrito shop.  He was older but definitely looked good.  I'm sure he caught me checking him out a few times and then tried to spark up a conversation like, "hmmmm... I wonder what Mexican Coca Cola taste like" ?  And then I was all, "Mexican Coca Cola is supposedly made with real sugar and not artificial sugar like American Coca Cola, I hear it has a better taste" .

All the while I was speaking to him, I never looked at him once.  Like the typical Native American I am I never made eye contact with him even when he started speaking to me again about Jicama.  He saw me get my favorite fresca drink - Horchata and he was all, "thats too bad they don't have Jicama" .  And I was all, "I think Jicama is too exotic for this place" , and he said, "no, they have it at another place on Church Street" .

And thats when I realized that if he knew Jicama was then he exactly knew what Mexican Coca Cola taste like and it made me feel even more stupid.

Meanwhile, I was trying to ask the counter ladies for forgiveness because I made them make me a Torta with fresh fajita steak which they obviously did not want to do during bar rush.

There was another cute guy in the Burrito Shop, an older good looking Mexican.  He was cute but I got turned off from him when he went to go sit down because he didn't want to eat.  He was obviously was trying to avoid over stuffing himself and keep his slender physique.

Thats was when I realized I was happy with being 38 years old and didn't have to worry anymore about assholes trying to fuck me for trying to look skinny and you know what, it felt good.

xoxo



Sunday, April 14, 2013

Feeling Better

This past week I checked myself into the ER at Highland Hospital because I could no longer bare the coughing, sneezing, congestion, and other flu like symptoms I've been going thru.  It was the wheezing in my lungs that was the last straw, it just sounded like I had a dieing cat trapped inside my lungs.

Enough was enough.  To make a long story short, the hospital gave me antibiotics and an inhaler.  Both worked like a charm because I'm feeling tons better.  My breathing has improved tremendously.  For the past couple of months, I've had this tightness in my lungs and could never take a full breath.  I just grinned and bared it the best I could.  I guess there really was crap in my lungs because it started to surface after taking my meds.  Seriously, I blew out of my nose the most disgusting loogy I've ever seen in my life.  It wasn't clear like any nostril flem but it had this weird discoloration like it was a caucus of a dead animal. When it came out, it just made think, "wow, so this is the shit thats been clogging my head and lungs all this time" .

Now that my health has improved, my quality of life is much better.  I've been jogging 3x a week since last Fall and finally, I can enjoy my runs without the tightness in my lungs.  I feel so stupid for not doing anything about it and just passing it off like a cold I could never shake. I can only imagine whatever respiratory illness I was carrying for so long also added to my depression.

I'm glad my personal health took a turn for the better because I start shooting my movie next week and I'm so excited.  For the next 6 weeks we'll be shooting, "All the Other Were Practice" , a post gay romantic comedy.  I want to say its a Bear movie but the film doesn't strictly stay within the Bear genre, the only Bear component in the movie is me.

I do have some shows coming up.  OJ Patterson asked me to close out his Storking Comedy show which is coming up in Oakland on Thursday this week.  I'm actually kind of excited about that because I have new material and can't wait to break it in.

So thats basically whats on my plate for the next couple of weeks.

xoxo


Thursday, April 4, 2013

How the Bears got to the Final Four

This upcoming weekend is the Final Four Division 1 Championship in Womens College Basketball and wouldn't you know it, one my favorite teams made it to the National Semi-finals, the University of California - Berkeley, which is right down the road from Oakland.

The Cal Bears Womens Basketball program has changed dramatically ever since the freak outbreak of meningitis that killed one of their players back in 2004, when their team was coached by Caren Horstmeyer.  After that happened, the team was in dismay, several players transferred to other schools and Caren was in the last year of her coaching contract.

The only bright spot that year was the incoming freshman class of Alexis Grey Lawson, Devenai Hampton, and Ashley Walker, all local stand outs from the East Bay who were highly recruited and choose to play their college ball at home.

In another change, the University of California decided not to extend Horstmeyers contract and hired a young and promising coach in Joanne Boyle.

In Coach Boyle's first year, she guided the Bears to their first NCAA appearance.

For the next couple of years the best Coach Boyle could do with her roster was guide her team to the Sweet Sixteen which wasn't to her detriment, her talented trio and lack of roster depth was never enough to make a deep run in the tourney.

Flash forward to 2010, the Cal Bears land one of the premier recruits in the country - Point Guard Tierra Rogers who led her high school Sacred Heart Cathedral of San Francisco to back to back state titles.

Upon her freshman year during a pre-season workout, Tierra collapses with a heart condition, quite literally ending her promising basketball career ever before it started.

And to make matters worse, CAL's new highly touted basketball coach - Joanne Boyle, jumps ship and transfers to the University of Virginia after leading the Cal Bears to their first WNIT Championship.

In a stunning move, CAL's Athletic Director Sandy Barbour brings back former Assistant Coach Lindsay Gottlieb, who coached under Joanne Boyle to guide the Bears into a new era of Cal basketball and boy did she.

In Coach Gottlieb's 2nd year as head coach she miraculously guides the Golden Bears to their first Final Four and best school record ever of 32 - 4.

Another partial to Gottlieb's success is that she was lucky to inherit several high quality recruits who followed Tierra Rogers to CAL and got the most out of their talent.  Coach Gottlieb's up tempo system matched the intensity of her players and other elite teams which turned out to be the ingredients for success.

Its been with great satisfaction that I have been able to watch the Cal program evolve and go thru their highs and lows of becoming a great basketball program, every team has their story of how they got there and this is theres.

Good luck to the Bears in the Final Four this upcoming weekend! #gobears

xoxo










Gay for Pay Comedy Show in SF WEEKLY

OMG, I'm the happiest Gay in the world. Mad Props to Comedian Nick Palm for being the front man for our, "Gay for Pay Comedy Show" , press photo and totally getting us into the SF WEEKLY (page 18) with that killer hair! And I was just saying to Nick and Ben Kolina that if this show doesn't get us into the local press, nothing will. Well guess what bitches, it sure did! This Hella Gay Show happens this Sunday *April 7th* at 1772 Market Street in San Francisco! Show @ 8pm, 10$ Cover, 21 & Over, No Drink Minimum.