Musings of the Crabby Shy/Wild

Not so much the show, but the model Katoucha Niane, whose body was found in the Seine the other day. A much sought after model of color long before the likes of Naomi Campbell, she by all accounts used her fame to speak out against the horrors of female circumcision.

This is hilarious, though I wouldn’t blast it at work. Funnier than Saturday Night Live - to me, at least. Except for that Annuale commercial. That was cracking me up too. Today is the day after Lost and the day before Saturday, speaking of. Ah, Friday… and Eighties fashions.

The model Naomi Campbell has been hospitalized in Brazil, proof that the benefits of a healthy diet and lifestyle are greatly exaggerated. Feel better.

I’m watching the Academy Awards. Not sure why, but I am. I imagine that I’m waiting to see Daniel Day-Lewis accept his award. It’d be nice to get a really good look at him. But currently the fellow they’ve given the honorary award to is rattling on in very non-linear fashion. I’m wondering if they’ll stop him. It seems like they probably wouldn’t be able to do that with the honorary award person, as this person is normally quite aged and doing so might seem rude. So I’ve taken to daydreaming about Edith Head and Berlin. What has just dawned on me is the fact that I’ve been rattling on in very non-linear fashion in this post. And so maybe the honorary award recipient is just bored and should go to bed.  

Every time I visit home with a friend who has never been there, I feel obliged to drag them up to Monticello. Well, no more. Several things happened. Several factors factored in. First of all, I went to see that Kara Walker exhibit at the Whitney a few weeks ago. An exhibit that, through paper cutouts and sometimes cartoony silhouettes, provided the most “real”and moving commentary on slavery that I have ever seen. And yes I’m counting Roots. But when Richard and I arrived at Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello last week my stomach kind of sank. It was as beautiful as ever, sitting atop a mountain in Albemarle county, with views down to Charlottesville and to the very University that he created for me to struggle through years later. But it was so beautiful and sanitized that I found it impossible to really grasp how a race of people had been made to suffer there, to lose their freedom and sometimes their dignity. The place is set up to exclude suffering of any kind, except our own, as Richard and I opted to hike up to the main house instead of cram ourselves in the shuttle van. Fat, midwestern tourists milled about eating Snickers bars from the gift shop and every so often paused at a small square of stones imbedded in the ground. They read the plaques and moved on, chomping away. “The remains of slave and artisan quarters…” It made me kind of sick and very angry. My friend the Photographer Andrew Shurtleff gave me a beautiful photo of the memorial to Sally Hemmings, rising above downtown Charlottesville several years ago so I will in the future drag friends somewhere similar. And then off to 216. We are still really divided. 

I’m here by myself, with an awful cough, hanging with the cats and packing for tomorrow. Things could be worse… What a waste. Here’s hoping the clothes she torched were off the rack. Speaking of which, the model’s name is Rita G and she’s wasting no time in cashing in. You can buy her used panties here. Blech - quite possibly NSFW, as I can’t bring myself to look. So, yeah, this is the essence of Valentine’s Day all around. Hot song, though.

Better listen up, Lewis and Clark. Though, in all fairness, they did turn the vacuum cleaner on in the middle of the night, presumably to vacuum, so, while that’s not a talent, per se…

It’s finally snowing! I mean, it won’t amount to much, but it’s pretty and long overdue. After being stranded on the A train this morning for 40 minutes between 14th Street and Penn Station I wasn’t taking any chances and so rushed home from work. The news outlets are having a field day. You’d think that it was raining fire. Histrionic correspondents are placed at nearly every intersection through the city. Apparently, I performed to form. Out of work as fast as if I had shot myself from a cannon and no plans to leave.

This weekend I am heading home to Virginia, with my buddy Richard. I can’t wait to show him Monticello, Ash Lawn, the trees I climbed as a kid in my mother’s back yard, the downtown homonazis, and Club 216. The latter is Charlottesville’s gay dance spot. Words cannot describe. Really it’s just gays trapped in a small town with limited resources making the most of it, while dancing to ill-conceived remixes. Think Beyond Thunderdome, with a soundtrack of ill-conceived remixes. The homonazis really were the pits, though. They thought that because they went to D.C. once a month they were on the cutting edge. Ah, and Escafe, where I danced as an undergrad every Thursday night to Hunter’s tunes. And marvelled at Hunter. Richard will get to meet decent people, too. Ones I don’t make fun of, like Sissy and Leslie. Actually, that’s a lie.

Men’s clothes - the kind that don’t cost an arm and a leg - are rather boring. So I’ve decided that, until such a time as I can walk into the Dior Hommes shop and order those assholes around, I will incorporate some women’s clothing into my wardrobe. First stop: the summer blouse. Much as I love throwing on jeans, Pumas, and a T-shirt why not substitute blouse for T-shirt? Ideally, I would like a halter blouse with one of those eighties floppy penis-looking collars but until I find one I’m rocking the blouse below, from J Crew. I might get an Easy-Bake Oven while I’m at it, too. In other exciting news, my friend Mark and I decided today that for Drag Invasion this summer I shall go as style icon Grace Jones, circa Mayday in A View to a Kill.