Sunday, January 10, 2010

Working Out

So I am on yet another one of my fitness kicks. This time I am really dedicated. I have been going to the gym every single day.....for the past two days. Today at the gym I really worked up a huge sweat doing that stair thingy, so I said let me run into the sauna for a few minutes to relax my newly found muscles before I go to work.
Now the sauna is always a little hard for me to deal with because I work out at the NY Sports Club and so does every hot Chelsea Boy in NY. What is a Chelsea Boy? A Chelsea Boy is a breed of gay most commonly found in the Chelsea area of NY. They are those guys with the perfect hair, the chiseled face and of course the perfect body, six pack and all. So basically the sauna is always draped with really hot, really muscular, really empty, but beautiful guys. However, today I say what the hay I've been working out everyday this week let's show it off. I strip down to my rolls and wrap a towel around me trying to cover the bad parts and accentuate the big, oops I mean good, part. I enter the room with nothing to hold onto except my towel, my locker key and what’s left of my pride.
I find a seat in between two boys that perfectly fit the above description. The sweat begins to trickle down my face and into my eyes, so I wipe it as best I can with sweaty hands. The sweat, now a waterfall, continues to trickle down my body and up and over my belly and hips. Yet I still have some sense of pride that I am sticking it out.
To my left sat what may have been the most beautiful guy I have ever seen...in the past five minutes. So as a lame excuse to sneak a peak at him I place my keys on the bench between us. A few minutes later I wanted to sneak another peak so I decide, let me push my keys back a little. In one swift motion I manage to wedge my keys good and tight between the bench and the wall. I thought oh my God how do I get these fucking keys out without making a scene? I cooly get up and pull the bench a bit to free the keys. After about what felt like an hour of doing this, still nothing.
Now dripping profusely with sweat I reach under the bench between Chelsea Boy legs trying to get the keys. Of course it was at this moment that my towel decided it was done and fell to my feet. Leaving my big white un-kept single ass up in the air for all to view. I let out a high pitched shriek and then grabbed my towel which led to me slipping into an almost full split. Finally I say, “haha sorry guys I'm not a freak I seemed to have gotten my keys wedged.” So a bunch of queens all get off the bench and start helping me pull at it, the bench that is. Now these were not small boys and the bench still did not budge. So as not to ruin their nails all the boys one by one gave up.
Now red as a cherrie and wet as a rag I say fuck it. I leave the sauna without my keys and head to the locker room. I stand there in my drenched towel waiting. Of course not one employee. Finally I have to pull it together and go to the door of the locker room. I peak my head out and see a guy working out near the door. “Psst pssst...can you help me?” I say while dripping wet in a towel. For some reason he looks at me weird. “Oh no, sorry I mean can you get me a worker?” He comes back with one, of course it’s a trainer. Why wouldn’t it be. I say “Yes hi I lost my key in the sauna it got stuck on the wood behind me!” I turn redder.
Now afraid of me, he goes and gets a bolt cutter. “Which lock is it?” In a sea of very manly big thick combo locks mine was the dainty little gold key lock. The muscle head trainer proceeds to clip my lock. Pulling and pushing, he is turning red in the face. I say “Do you need some help?”...and in saying that I meant should I get someone to help you. He says “Sure give it a try if you want to”. So I take the bolt cutters and with what teeny tiny bit of pride I had left I pushed that cutter like a motherfucker. Low and behold I cut the lock. He says “Wow dude are you like a locksmith or something?” I said “No, I've just been working out a lot this week”...

Sticks and Stones and Guns

Something that I learned later in life, that I wish I had of known in high school, is that if you speak back to a bully they usually always become a little pussy ass bitch. This would of been really helpful information when being shoved in a locker. They should tell you this at orientation. Or at least take aside the fat queenie gay boys and the scrawny geeks and tell them. Maybe they can’t. Maybe knowing this information would throw off the balance of the universe.
Case in point. Tonight I get out of work late. I am tired, it was a bit of a stressful day at my job and I am a single gay man on a diet. So I am like the Anti-Christ. It seems that when you are on a diet the smallest thing sets you off. You could eat someone’s head off partly because they annoyed you and partly because you are famished. I am still at the point where I get the shakes when I pass a sign for ice cream. You scream, I scream, we all scream for ice cream. God do I scream for ice cream.
I come out of Macy's, there is always room for a little retail therapy after work, and I am walking to Penn Station to catch my train back to Long Island. Or as the natives say “Lawn Guyland.” When out of nowhere this gaggle of guetto guys say "Nice purse, hahaha!" Immediately I thought “excuse me, this is a the Louis Vuitton Carry All 800, it cost me $1,100! Who the hell are you?!” However, I thought that statement would be lost on them. So instead I decide to speak in their language... “Fuuuuck you!" I say, with any over emphasized uuuuck! One of them giggles at the one who had said nice purse. I wasn't happy. I then turn around and walk back to them.
This is something I never would of done in high school. I felt so tough, like John Wayne approaching his enemy. I could almost hear the whistling music in the background. I swear a tumble weed blew by. I wanted to say "You better watch yo mouth before I pop a cap in yo head bitch"....but then I remembered I was white, and that I also didn't have a gun. I don't like to not be able to follow through on my death threats. I like to be a man of his words. So instead I say "What?! What?!” To which they said nothing. “Ya not so fucking tough when someone answers back...are you bitch?!”
I swear the earth stood still, I think I heard silverware falling from hands across the city. Soda fountains kept filling overflowing cups. The city waited for their response. They all just look at me in shock, turn and walk away. “Eye of The Tiger” played faintly in the background. I walked triumphantly into Penn Station. So you see it just goes to show, we must not fear assholes. Their words are only powerful if you give them the power. Now, I know it is best to just ignore ignorant people like that. But as I said before I am on a diet, cut me some slack. All in all I think I handled the situation really well.
I know what you are thinking “Sticks and Stones.” I should have just ignored them and been the bigger person. Maybe you are right, maybe I should have. Either way, tomorrow I think I will apply for a fire arms license. After all, I’ve always wanted to threaten to pop a cap in someone’s ass...

21 Days

This morning I was running late for the train, as usual. I pull up to the parking lot in my beaten up VW Beetle in hot pursuit of a space. Of course the only one available was about twenty miles from the platform. Whatever, beggars can’t be choosers so I take it. No matter how late I am there is always time for coffee. So I burst into the bagel store. Just let me say. I have started a new diet. So I am a little edgy. However, I read that if you do the same thing for 21 days it becomes a habit and you will not even think about it. So I am trying to only eat little amounts of healthy food for 21 days. As opposed to the huge amounts of fast food I usually eat. The article did say that when you try to not focus on something, and in my case while being a little famished, you could tend to not be able to concentrate. It said you may seem to become a bit of a scatter brain. Thank God I have not experienced that yet. I'm a scatter brain as it is. If I don't write things down I forget to do them, and you know I like the old fashioned planners filled with sticky notes and bits of torn paper. I enjoy violently crossing things out when they are done. I find it much more satisfying than pressing delete.
Where was I? Bagel store right. Well the women that work there are so funny. Every morning when I walk in its "Hey Marc, the hair came out good today!" or the occasional "Mmm you smell nice, which one is that?". They are always the first to notice when I change the color(s) of my hair or try out a new cologne. I wonder if I can color my hair before next weekend. I always know when I am having a bad hair day because they don't mention my hair, sometimes it’s a little off putting.
Anyway, so this morning I burst in the door in a hustle. "Hey Marc!" "Hey Gloria." So because of my new diet, well not really a diet. I am re-training myself! Like a little dog. God my little dog is so hard to train, just this morning he tried to pee on the bath matt...again! Only this time it was while I was standing on it. He's got some balls, well actually no he doesn't I had them cut off. He didn't even look at me for about a week, he was so disgusted. He lay on that guilt trip like a Jewish mother. Do dogs have religions? Could he be Jewish? I wonder. Do they have a separate doggie God? Do they laugh about how God backwards is Dog? Did they invent the word God?
So I am looking for something healthy, and small, to eat. Not small like a truffle or small like an egg and cheese biscuit small. God those are so good. McDonald's makes the best breakfast. No I mean small like a pea. As in princess and the pea. Like some stupid princess who spends all day brushing her hair, like Jan Brady, would be in tune enough to feel a pea below 50 mattresses. Come on now, I don't buy it for a minute. No, no, I want to make a healthy choice. Not like those frozen Healthy Choice meals. Let me just say, frozen fake food like that is not a “healthy choice”. I mean like V8 healthy. God they taste like asshole. I would know. You know this one time...never mind. I feel like someone working at V8 just finally admitted to the owner of the company, "Uh...ya know boss, this drink kinda tastes like ass. Really, you are the only one who likes drinking cold tomato soup. The rest of the world drinks it because you make them feel guilty not too." So, they came up with V8 Fusion. I think the ad actually says something like “All the benefits of V8, without the taste, all you taste is the fruit.” I could do that.
Well the bagel ladies didn't have V8 Fusion, they had V8 Splash. Is this the same thing? Is it like the starter version to ween you off of cold soup taste? Do I have to drink this for 21 days before I can drink V8 Fusion? "Marc, you only have two minutes." What is she my mother now?! "Thanks Gloria!" Hesitantly I bought the V8 Splash, Kiwi-Strawberry. That flavor always reminds me of my friend Karen. She used to drink Kiwi-Strawberry Snapple like it was going out of style. This was back in high school. Man in high school I ate like a horse and never gained weight, and I am pretty sure I had McDonald's for more than 21 days straight. So I get a yogurt to go with my V8 Splash. I figured a little substance is “a good thing.” Martha, Martha, Martha, whatever happened to her?
I am very proud of myself I made the right choices. I ignored that amazing butter croissant, that is just slightly golden around the edges and fluffy and light in the middle with just the right amount of butter dripping down your fingers as you eat it. No, I went with the healthy choice. I even skipped my coffee. I stuck to my guns and made it happen. You know this diet...well "re-training" is going very well! No side effects yet. I think I can make. Just 20 more days to go...

The Need To Explain

I just feel the need to explain myself. I am reading some of these stories and God they make me look like such a freak. They show me completely making a fool of myself over and over again. They really seem unbelievable, but believe me they are all one hundred percent true. You can’t make this shit up.
I think if a psychiatrist was reading these he would have me locked up. They would think that I am a complete risk to myself. It’s not that I’m crazy, well I guess I am a little crazy. We all are in our own way. It’s not that I am dangerous. Though sometimes I end up in dangerous situations. It’s just that I am looking for love in all the wrong places. And I mean ALL the wrong places. Places in which you don’t look for anything let alone love.
I think what I am is a hopeless romantic klutz. But it’s just who I am. These are my stories. My day to days. These are my thoughts, my actions, my fears, my hopes, my laughter, my point of view. The stories may be rough the grammar a bit sophomoric, but they are written from the heart. There are no pretenses, no intensions. I did not go through them with a red pen and try to spice them up. They are rough, raw, real, and ready.
I don’t claim to be a literary person, heck I would be the first to admit that I hate to read. I’m just a Gay Hot Mess that, through many years of embarrassing moments and broken hearts, has learned to look at the situation and find the humor. My life makes me laugh...I hope you laugh too.