The Halloween Homophobe

Bloomington, October 1983

When I was growing up, my church deemed alcohol the worst possible sin, worse than murder or reading the Sunday newspaper or talking to a Catholic.  We couldn't eat food that once contained alcohol, like "beer batter shrimp."  We couldn't set foot in a bar, a restaurant that sold alcohol, or a grocery store with a beer section.  Some Nazarenes wouldn't let the doctor swab their arms with alcohol before giving them a shot.

 I've overcome many of the strictures of my childhood, but to this day I can't bring myself to drink anything alcoholic.  I've never had wine.  I've had only one and a half cans of beer in my life.

Why one and a half?

It was 1983, my second year at Indiana University, and my friend Viju and I had just moved into an apartment together.  On the Saturday before Halloween, we invited several of our gay friends and their dates to a party. We provided homoerotic snacks like penis-shaped cookies, plus Cokes and Sprites (and some of the guys brought beer).  We planned some double-entendre laden party games, an erotic Chamber of Horrors in Viju's bedroom, and finally the Halloween costume contest at Bullwinkle's.

I was going as Pan, the Greek god, with shaggy leggings and horns, Viju was a cop, and Jimmy the Bodybuilder on Crutches said he was coming as a vampire,  Joseph from the Gay Student Alliance was a shirtless Zorro, Terry from Eigenmann Hall was a drag queen witch, Mark the optometry major was Superman, and his date, a shy but extremely cute undergrad named Scott, was a gymnast.

Jimmy took a long time to get up the stairs, so I heard him coming, and opened the door to say hello.

My jaw dropped.  His  "date" was his friend Tony, who was straight,  and didn't know that Jimmy was gay.

Apparently Jimmy hadn't realized that it was a gay party.

In the 1980s, you simply did not come out, to anyone, except maybe your family and closest childhood friends, and then only after extensive preparation.  But in a moment a straight guy would be in our tiny living room with six gay men who weren't closeting their behavior.

Thinking fast, I yelled at Tony, "Where's your girlfriend?"

Straight guy! Closet time! Mark and his date, Scott, immediately slid apart.   Joseph grabbed the tray of penis-shaped cookies and rushed them into the kitchen, Terry took off his wig and earrings to transform his costume from witch to Uncle Fester, and Viju ran to slam the door to the erotic Chamber of Horrors. Someone turned on It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown.  



Tony helped Jimmy through the door.  "I don't have a girlfriend," he said, glancing around the room, probably thinking "whoa, sausage fest."  "I was hoping to meet some girls here."

Glaring at Jimmy for being such a dope, I said,  "Sure, sure.  We're going trick-or-treating in the girls' dorm later."

You're probably thinking: why bother to closet ourselves?  It was seven against one.  What could he possibly do?

We soon found out.

Tony asked to use the bathroom.  I pointed the way.

A moment later, I heard his shrill voice: "Boomer, get in here!"

Apparently he had opened the wrong door.  He was standing in my bedroom, where there was a replica of Michelangelo's David on my desk, and the wall by the bed plastered with pictures of naked men torn out of In Touch and Mandate. 

"Where are the girls?" he asked.

"What girls?"

For a moment he just stared, speechless.  Then the tirade began.  "Are you trying to tell me that you're queer?  Don't you know that this lifestyle spreads diseases?  Don't you know that God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah because they were homos?"

"Um...."

Suddenly he became more conciliatory.  "Look, it's probably not too late.  You could rethink your decision."

Rethink your decision!  I was already angry with him for forcing my party into the closet, and this was the last straw. "Oh, gee," I yelled, "I had no idea.  Thanks for the heads-up!  I'll turn back to straight right away!"  I tore down some of the pictures from my wall, wadded them up, and threw them at his feet.

Then I ran back into the living room.  "Boobs!" I grunted.  "Boobs and football and...um, beer!"  I grabbed a can of beer, popped the top, and guzzled some.  It tasted horrible.

Tony followed, no longer conciliatory. "Did you guys know that Boomer is a homo?  He probably wants to take you back into his little chamber of horrors and do nasty, perverted things to you."

Um...yes, I was counting on it," Joseph said.

"You're queer?" Tony asked.  "Maybe you're all queer! Did you invite me and Jimmy up here to try to turn us that way, too?"

Of course, we should have shown him the door.  But we were not "out and proud."  We were coming from the dull despair of the 1970s Midwest, where gay people, when mentioned at all, were portrayed as utterly despicable.  Some of us were still working through feelings of guilt and shame, the nagging doubts: What if we really are sick?  What if God really does hate us?

"Count me out,  I just turned straight," I said, roiling with rage. "Boobs!  Football!  Beer!  Hey, turn the game on! This show sucks -- Charlie Brown is a fag!"  I drained my beer -- it still tasted terrible -- and started another.

Viju glared at Jimmy, "Hey, psychology major, maybe you should tell your buddy something?"

Jimmy hung his head.

"Oh, no, not Jimmy, too!" Tony exclaimed.  "He's handicapped!  Couldn't you perverts leave him alone?  Stick to the schoolyards!"

"Hey, I've never done it in a schoolyard!  Schoolbus, maybe!"  The room was starting to spin.  Was this what it felt like to be drunk?  "When I was six I married the boy next door."

Tony ignored me.  "How can you do those...those disgusting things?" he continued, this time addressing Mark and Scott.  "Do you hate yourself that much, or are you trying to get back at your parents, or do you just hate God?"

Scott the shy undergrad looked like he was about to cry.

Enough was enough!  I walked over to Tony and calmly poured the rest of my beer on his head.

That's why I've had only 1 1/2 cans of beer in my life.

Surprisingly, Jimmy and Tony stayed friends.  It wasn't Jimmy's fault, after all, that he had been "brainwashed" by a pack of "perverts."

And as my reward, I got to spend 7 minutes in the Chamber of Horrors with Scott the shy undergrad.

See also: Sharing the Optometrist's Boyfriend; Joseph and I Get Intimate in a Haunted House.

My Student Steals My Boyfriend

Bloomington, December 1983

When I was in graduate school at Indiana University, there were 30,000 students wandering around on the 2,000 acre campus, but still, everybody knew Jimmy, a graduate student in psychology.  He was a familiar sight, tromping across the campus on his forearm crutches.

 Jimmy had cerebral palsy, so his legs didn't work well, although he could walk slowly without crutches inside the house.  Also his hands were a little stiff.

Do you know what happens to a guy who doesn't use his legs much?  His chest, shoulders, and biceps overcompensate.  He becomes "cut" in bodybuilder lingo, a pale hard slab of marble.  Incredible.

One night in September 1983, while Viju and I were cruising at Bullwinkle's,  he came in.  I yelled "Score!" (or the 1980s equivalent).

Jimmy  invited me back to the terrible house he shared with two other psychology grad students, who hadn't cleaned the place since 1978.  There was a half-full carton of milk on the kitchen table that expired six months ago.

Sometimes we went to the apartment I shared with Viju, but not often: it was up a flight of stairs, and the only way he could get up and down was to be carried.

We dated through the fall semester, going to dinners and movies and to the bars.  Sometimes we went into Indianapolis to the bars or museums, to see Pippin and Godspell.

Jimmy had just come out a few days before we met in Bullwinkle's, so none of his family and friends knew that he was gay.

His best friend Tony found out when Jimmy invited him to our Halloween party, and for some reason he went into my bedroom and saw that my wall was emblazoned with pictures of hot guys torn from magazines.

"Where are the pictures of girls?" Tony asked, dumfounded.

He didn't handle it well.  First he yelled at Jimmy for hanging out with a "pervert," and when Jimmy said that he was gay, too, he accused me of brainwashing him.  When he discovered that there were other gay guys at the party, he ran screaming off into the night.

Jimmy helped us decide if Professor Singer was gay by going along on Viju's  intel-gathering mission.

At Thanksgiving he invited Viju and me to his parents' house in Crawfordsville, but to avoid another scene, we played it cool.  I even responded to a question about "my girlfriend" with a story about a tall blonde soccer player from Iceland.

On December 3rd, a little over a week later, when Jimmy told me: "We didn't plan on it, but I fell in love with another guy.  We're moving in together."

What guy?

Steve (I forgot the last name.)

One of my students!

Grad students at Indiana teach their own classes, and Steve was one of the back-of-the-class students in Intro to Literature, getting straight C's, never participating much.  He was sort of cute, but not very muscular.

All I could think was: What chutzpah!  Stealing the professor's boyfriend, just before final grades are due!

And I told my parents that I was bringing someone special home for Christmas.  What would they say?

Steve spent the last week of the semester grinning at me, daring me to give him a vengeance F.

I didn't.  He got a C.   Then he moved into Jimmy's horrible house where nothing was ever cleaned, and I invited Viju home for Christmas.

During the spring semester, I often saw Jimmy tromping across the campus on his crutches.  He looked happy

My Platonic Friends and their Boy Toy

Plains, April 2014

I was asked if there were any platonic friendships in the gay communities of the 1980s and 1990s.  Any guys you hung out with but never saw like this?

Not many.  Some acquaintances at church and the gym, some "friends of friends" you met at parties.

But your friends, the people you called on the telephone, invited over for dinner, went out with, were mostly guys you had dated, along with their current boyfriends, whom you were invited to share.

Sometimes you made friends without dating first, but you still shared boyfriends and, by the time I got to Florida, hookups.

There was hardly anyone who moved from acquaintance to friend without bedroom activity.

Guys who were celibate?  Not many of those.

Guys in monogamous relationships?  They mostly kept to themselves and stayed acquaintances.

What about guys you weren't attracted to?  It was considered impolite to refuse sharing, so unless he was literally repugnant, you at least did some desultory groping.

When I moved Upstate in 2008, I found sharing uncommon, either due to changing times or the culture of the Straight World.  The Gang of Twelve had all dated each other, but at different times.  I had to introduce Troy to the practice.

And when I got to the Plains, I even met guys who expected friendship without a bedroom.

I met them at the gym sometime in April 2014, just after Troy moved back upstate, leaving me alone on the Plains.

Hank was in his 50s, a tall redhead with nice abs, a moderately hairy chest, and a gigantic Mortadella+ beneath the belt.  He worked as an electrician.

His partner Wayne was in his 70s: a retired high school history teacher, a rather chubby bear, bald, white haired, with an impressively thick Bratwurst.

Ten years ago, they were both married with children, seeking secret partners on the downlow. They met at an outdoor cruising site, but the anonymous hookup soon turned into dating and romance.  They divorced the wives, moved to the nearest big city (this was a big city?), and came out as a gay couple.

I invited them to the Metropolitan Community Church -- they hadn't known that gay churches existed.

When they invited me over for dinner later that week, I naturally assumed it was for dinner and sharing.

They lived in an old farmhouse out in the country that they were having "fun" remodeling: the whole upstairs was still unfinished.

While Wayne finished cooking, Hank gave me a tour of the rest of the house: living room, dining room, study, and two bedrooms in colonial American style, with tall chairs, an antique secretary desk,  an old cupboard to hold the tv, and framed portraits of dour Puritan ancestors.

It was all rather boring, especially when Wayne went into detail about how they imported 9' grills for the grillwork, and redid the wainscotting around the landscaping and added .4 inch recessed bludgers with special prehensile bars and anodized aluminum pistons.

You've seen them at the gym, I told myself.  They're worth a little boredom.

I was surprised when the tour took me out into their formal colonial garden.  There was a modern enclosed redwood deck, with a hot tub.  And a boy sunbathing nude on a lawn chair: slim, sandy-haired, smooth chest, uncut Kielbasa.

"This is Jimmy," Hank said.  "He's renting our basement room in exchange for helping us remodel."

"Nice to meet you!" Jimmy said with the cruisy smile I always get from twinks. He reached up to shake my hand and almost pulled me into his lap.  "Are you a remodeler too?"

"I'm a professor at the University."

"Cool, I'm a student.  I'll sign up for your classes next semester.  Maybe you can give me some...you know, extra credit assignments."

I've only heard that one about a thousand times before.  But -- Hank, Wayne, and Jimmy?  This evening was getting better and better.

But Jimmy didn't join us for dinner.  "Oh, he doesn't want to hang out with us grandpas," Wayne explained.  "He's a young guy, into dance clubs and bath houses, all that stuff we did 30 years ago.

Anyway, there was still Hank and Wayne.

Wayne's forte was cooking.  He served chicken in an acidic tomato sauce over pasta, with tiramisu for dessert.  I hated it, but still, I had to listen to every ingredient and the minutiae of cooking techniques described in detail.

 No one ever has soda, so I brought Diet Coke, and had to listen to Wayne pontificate about how phenylalanine and aspartame would kill me.

Meanwhile Hank described how they built or refurbished the furniture with prehensile oak tachyons and tapestry lining from an old anchor basting wobble he got in an estate sale.

Still, sharing....

But after dinner came 1 1/2 hours of stories about remodeling, refurbishing, real estate, recipes, and pontifications about the evils of bottled water and Delicious apples.  With no one making a move.

Toto, I don't think we're in Oz anymore.

Maybe we just needed the young guy as a catalyst.  I invited them over for dinner, and specified "be sure to bring along that cute roommate of yours."

The three of them showed up with homemade cookies that Wayne made using a new recipe of grated fruit rind, plus molasses substituted for sugar and some peach pits that he got at a farmer's market last year dusted with nutmeg and cardamon, with a few dashes of coriander and spliced pecan buds for flavor.

Ok, ok.

After dinner, I invited them into the living room, where Jimmy sat next to me on the couch, and the other guys chose armchairs.  We chatted, drank coffee, and Jimmy fondled my knee.  I put my arm around his shoulders, pulled up his shirt, and ran my hand across his chest and abs.  We started kissing.

I looked up.  Hank and Wayne were putting their shoes on.  "It's about time for us to be going," Hank said with a broad grin.

"Wait...um..."

"Oh, don't worry," Wayne said.  "Jimmy brought his own car, so he can drive home in the morning. Thanks for a nice evening."

'Wait...um..."

And, having fixed me up with their roommate, they were gone.

"I thought they'd never leave!" Jimmy exclaimed, looking at me expectantly.

"Don't you ever...um...share with them?"

He laughed.  "Are you kidding? I mean, I'd like to, but those guys are like in bed by 9:00 pm with warm milk.  No sexual interest at all.  I don't think they've done anything but cuddle for years, even with each other....so, want to take a shower?"

Dating a 21-year old does have some advantages.

See also: Yuri and the Muscle Daddies.; My Date with the Star of "Wizards of Waverly Place," and Ricky with a Y

12 Disabled Dates and Handicapped Hookups

20% of the population has a disability.  10% has a severe disability, requiring special aids to engage in everyday activities.

10% is a lot.   If you hookup once a week, you'll be going down on five disabled guys in a year.  If you have 10 boyfriends during the course of your life, one of them will probably be disabled.

Most disabled guys don't want to be fetishized, felt sorry for, or complimented on how bravely they have overcome adversity.  They just want to have the things everybody else has: a job, an apartment, friends, boyfriends, and erotic exploration.

Here are 12 disabled dates and handicapped hookups, plus a couple of sausage sightings.











1. Danny from third grade, who I pushed my way into a friendship with in third grade, wore a leg brace.  I ran into him in high school, and was invited to a sleepover at his house.  Nice sausage sighting.

2. Mark, a paraplegic due to a diving accident, was in some of my classes at Augustana.  Nice upper body.














3. Jimmy, the Bodybuilder on Crutches.  When I was in grad school in Bloomington, I started dating Jimmy, a grad student in social work who had cerebral palsy: he had to use crutches to get around, giving him an amazing bodybuilder's physique with 0% body fat.

4. Mario, a very cute deaf leatherman used to be a regular at the Faultline in West Hollywood.  Lane and I had him over for a three-way.

5. Jester, The Blind Guy with the Kovbasa+, who Fred dated after he broke up with Matt.  As a teenager, he tried to commit suicide by shooting himself, but ended up blind instead.

6. Ramon, who had a missing right arm, asked me to go ice skating with him in New York.  I had never been ice skating before.
















7. Raphael, Gay Psychic Angel.  In Florida in 2002, an angel showed up at my door to discuss New Age religions.  He did a psychic reading, we kissed, and he gave me his telephone number, but I chickened out.  His arms didn't work; they hung loosely at his side.

8. Ethan, the Boy in the Wheelchair, who I met in Dayton in 2005.  He wanted an S&M scene, which involved tying his hands behind his back and his non-working legs together.

9. Tommy in Dayton.  Another blind guy I dated, who said he could tell someone's penis size by listening to them urinate.  Or you could just feel your way.

10. Andy, who I met at a comic book store on the Plains in 2015, had more severe cerebral palsy than Jimmy: slurred speech, spastic movements.  He had a Daddy fetish, and wanted to rip my clothes off -- not very easy when your hands don't work well.

11. Robert, who I met on the Plains in 2015.  He was deaf but could lip-read, and wanted a S&M scene.  No blindfold, of course.

12. My Mentally Disabled Neighbor, who took me on a date to see Kansas, and then back to his apartment for the "underwear" stuff.

The Sunday Morning Orgy

Plains, August 2014

Sunday morning, 8:00 sharp.  There's a knock on the door.  I peer through the peephole: it's my ex-boyfriend Jimmy the Boy Toy, and Kyle, the twink he dumped me for, plus at least three guys I don't know.

 "Hi...what...."

"We're surprising you with a West Hollywood party!" Jimmy announces. "This is Chester, Ravi, and Jeff."  They pile into the apartment and start setting out bagels, cream cheese, fruit, and yogurt.  "Got any plates?" someone yells.

"Party -- what?"

"Kyle and I know you're feeling depressed on the Plains, after going back to California last month,  missing all those wild West Hollywood parties, so we thought we'd bring one to you."

"Um,,,those usually took place at night, and we had a little advance warning."  I haven't showered or shaved yet, the bedroom is a mess, and you never have strangers in your house without locking up your valuables!

"Then it wouldn't be a surprise, would it?"

 "Well...where did you meet these guys?"

Chester is Kyle's ex-boyfriend; Ravi, a friend of Jimmy's visiting from California; and Jeff is  a guy they hooked up with on Grindr last night.

"Ok, ok, let me just get dressed."

"That won't be necessary!" Jimmy said, reaching into my bathrobe to grope me.  "First game -- Celebrity Dating!"

The Celebrity Dating Contest

"Wait -- West Hollywood parties usually begin with dinner."

He hands me a plate with a bagel smeared with way too much cream cheese and a small bunch of grapes.  "Ok, everybody tells about a date or hookup with a celebrity.  Then we have to decide if he is telling the truth or lying.  The one who guesses right the most wins a prize, ten minutes in the bedroom with whoever he wants!"

Me; Nate Richert, star of Sabrina the Teenage Witch (true)
Jimmy: Dylan O'Neil, star of Teenage Werewolf (true)
Kyle: Nathan Kress of ICarly (made up)
Chester: Tom Cruise (made up)
Ravi: Matt Dallas, star of Kyle XY (true)
Jeff: Justin Bieber (made up)

I get Ravi's story wrong.  Chester, the ex-boyfriend of Jimmy's new boyfriend, gets them all right, and chooses me as his prize.  He's a brown-haired nerd with glasses, a weak chin,  prominent ears, and a long, thin Mortadella.  We kiss and fondle, and then he goes down on me for a few minutes.  I push him down on the bed and start going down on him. Then the timer buzzes.

 "You're just in time for the next game," Jimmy announces.  "The Guess the Contest."


The Guess the Sausage Contest

"Ok, everybody go in the bathroom and snap a pic of your penis, flaccid.  We have to guess which belongs to who.  The one who guesses all five correctly gets to spend ten minutes alone in the bedroom with the guy of his choice."

It's harder than you might think to identify a penis not attached to a body, even if you've been with the guy before.  Size, shape, color, cut-uncut status....

Kyle, Jimmy's new boyfriend, guesses  them all accurately, and picks me. I'm beginning to think that these games are rigged -- but he's very sexy, short, brown-haired,  slim and smooth, with soulful puppy-dog eyes and a rather small uncut penis. We go into the bedroom and kiss and fondle, and then I go down on him -- it takes him only a few minutes to finish with an enormous squirt.  Then the timer goes off.

Kyle rushes into Jimmy's arms.  "Looks like someone enjoyed his prize," he says.  "Next -- the Date from Hell contest."

The Date from Hell Contest

"Everybody has to tell about the worst possible date, where the guy was a complete and utter jerk -- nobody in this room, please -- and everything goes wrong.  Then we vote on a scale of one to ten.  The one with the most points gets to -- you know it -- go into the bedroom for ten minutes with the guy of his choice.

I won't go into detail about the Dates from Hell -- maybe I'll tell about them in other stories -- but Chester gets the most points.  He selects Jeff: in his mid-30s, balding, with close-cropped rusty hair and a beard, a very hairy chest, and, I discover later, a thick beercan-sized Bratwurst.

While we're chatting and waiting for the timer to go off, Ravi pulls me into the kitchen.  He's in his mid-20s, South Asian, dark skin, thick black hair, unshaven beard, hairy chest.

"I've been trying to win the prize, so I could pick you, but I'm no good at these games.  Do you think we could hook up later, after the other guys leave?"

"Absolutely."  We begin kissing and fondling. Then the timer goes off, and we all return to our seats.

"Next contest," Jimmy says, "No-Hands Arousal."

"Wait, I never heard of that one..."

No Hands Arousal

"Everybody get naked and sit still.  You can't touch yourself or anyone else.  The first person who becomes fully aroused wins.  He gets to ask anyone he wants to go down on him, either here or in the bedroom."

The other guys are barely tumescent before Ravi rises to full arousal, his penis pressing hard against his belly.  "I choose Boomer," he says.  "But in the bedroom."

"Ok," Jimmy says.  "You have ten minutes."

I kneel in front of Ravi and go down on him.  He is average sized, but very hard, an iron rod.  I continue working on him until he finishes, then raise up and kiss him.

We're still kissing when the timer goes off.  Back in the living room, the other guys are sitting naked.  I take off my bathrobe.








The Sharing

"Ok, time for sharing," Jimmy says.  "Three of us in the bedroom, and three in the study."

"No, the study's off limits," I say.

"Three of us right here in the living room.  The only rule is, Kyle and I have to go together.  Boomer, who do you want?"

Definitely Ravi, which means I can't go with Jimmy and Kyle.  I've already been with Chester today, so "Jeff."

The three of us go into the bedroom.  I go down on Jeff while he and Ravi kiss. Then he tops Ravi while Ravi goes down on me.  When we finish, Ravi and I leave Jeff sleeping and return to the living room, where I go down on Jimmy -- that makes five!  Chester goes in the bedroom to rouse Jeff.

It's lunchtime, so we all get dressed and go out to eat -- except Jeff, who has to get home to his wife!  We hadn't realized that he was on the downlow.

"Thanks for the party," I tell Jimmy.  "It was fun, even though it was nothing like a West Hollywood party.  It was really more like a Sunday Morning Orgy."

When I open my wallet to pay, I discover that my credit cards and id are still there, but around $50 in cash is missing. Jeff must have nicked it when he was left in the room alone.

That's why you always hide your valuables with strangers in the house!

Oh, well.  It's worth $50 to go down on five guys.  Plus get bagels.

See also: How to Host a Real West Hollywood Party; My Platonic Friends and Their Boy Toy

The Sausage Sighting at the Film Festival

The Plains, Spring 2015

When I lived in the gay neighborhoods of Los Angeles, New York, and Fort Lauderdale, there were annual Gay and Lesbian Film Festivals to attend.

In the Straight World, not so much.  You can go to mainstream film festivals to see an occasional gay-themed piece (mostly about gay teens being bullied at school) amid the many selections about lonely, isolated heterosexuals and melancholy children:

A woman tries to keep the rattling suitcase of her dead husband closed.

A young boy walks through a deserted city to a house where a little girl is ballet-dancing.

A man chases a balloon through a subway station.

A young girl collects fallen leaves.

There is occasional beefcake.  Graham Patrick Martin, who played a gay hustler on Major Crimes, plays a guy who hires an "authentic girlfriend," and instead of sex, gets a nagging harridan.  But at least he takes his shirt off.

Buffed Polish actor and dancer Rafal Iwaniuk, who has posted a "like" of a gay sauna in Warsaw on Facebook (unless it's another Rafal Iwaniuk) plays a tough who sits next to a guy on a train and makes him feel threatened.

The festival of short films here on the Plains last year was sponsored by the University, and held in three venues downtown.  Most of the shorts I saw were held in a t-shaped theater with folding chairs and couches.

My date (Jimmy the Boy Toy) and I sat on a couch on the left side of the "t," where we could see the screen and the projection booth, a narrow room separated from us by a curtain.

The projectionist stood and walked into the "t" to adjust the sound and so on.  Otherwise he slouched on a couch just in back of the curtain.  He didn't realize that I could see his legs and crotch perfectly, especially when the screen lit up with a bright scene.

He was a college student, tall, a little chunky, with thick hair and a bright, androgynous face, wearing a festival sweater, and very tight jeans that displayed a substantial basket.

He usually didn't watch the movies.  He texted on his cell phone with one hand.  The other was lying on his inner thigh, parallel to his crotch.

Right next to his bulge.

I nudged Jimmy.  We both put our heads on our elbows and pretended to fall asleep so we could see better.

This short was about a young man locked in a room with several versions of himself banging on the door, trying to get in.  Not very interesting.

The projectionist was now paging through something on his cell phone.  I couldn't see what.

He was starting to tent!

The short ended.  He got up to cue the next one: about a woman trying to assemble the fragments of her ruined life in a deserted basement.

Texting again, then back to paging through something.  Porn?  His hand moved to his crotch.  Now he was cupping.

I looked closely.  He was starting to fondle.  The tent came up.

The short ended.  He stood, tenting, and went to cue the next one.  A woman who is distracted by vivid daydreams, and goes to a clinic in an attempt to become "normal," but ends up dancing with unicorn people.

This was a long film, nearly twenty minutes.  The projectionist lounged on the couch and paged through his cell phone again.  The tent returned.  He began to fondle it.

Would he pull it out?

Yes!  Well, at least he unzipped.  Now the tent was in his white briefs, a clear view of a fully aroused Bratwurst+!

He fondled it for a few moments, then slid it back into his pants and went back to texting.

Unfortunately, at the 2016 festival, there was a different projectionist in the t-shaped theater, and no tenting happened.

I did get a glimpse of one of the participants at the urinal.

Impressive, but not really worth sitting through six hours of films about lonely, isolated heterosexuals and melancholy children.

See also: My Platonic Friends and Their Boy Toy; Topped by the Vietnamese Twink

My Date with a Star of "The Wizards of Waverly Place"

Plains, April 2014

I'm at Whiskey River, a Plains restaurant which doesn't really serve whiskey, with Jimmy the Boy Toy, the housemate of my older platonic friends: 21 years old, slim, sandy-haired, with the most perfect uncut Kielbasa I've ever seen.

This is our fifth date: we've somehow become boyfriends.

I've been dating younger guys for years, and there are some strategic problems:
1. I go to bed at 10:00 pm, and they are still up at 2:00 am..
2. They always order the most expensive entree on the menu, plus a drink and dessert, and expect me to pay for it.
3. They want sex five times a night, and expect me to comply.
4. Their friends don't want me hanging around.
5. I don't understand most of their cultural references.

When the excitement of dating an older guy wears off, they usually move on to someone closer to their own age.

I need to impress Jimmy with something other than my physique and checkbook.

 How about a celebrity dating story?  They usually impress guys.

But not my usual Michael J. Fox or Richard Dreyfuss: too old.  Jimmy would get a blank expression and ask "Who?"

How about Nate Richert, Harvey on the TGIF sitcom Sabrina the Teenage Witch (1996-2003)?  We made out at a gay dance club in West Hollywood.  I felt an aroused Kielbasa in his pants.

No, not famous enough.  Besides, Jimmy was born in 1993, so he probably wouldn't remember Sabrina the Teenage Witch

I could just make up a celebrity dating story out of an innocent meeting or autograph signing. Guys in West Hollywood did it all the time.

Who's famous now?  Who have I been posting about on my blog recently?

The Goldbergs, Neil Diamond, Mickey Rooney, Kevin Zegers, a lot of Estonians,   The Wizards of Waverly Place! The Disney Channel teencom (2007-2012) about a family of wizards in modern day New York, with innumerable gay subtexts and an endless supply of teenage beefcake.

The teenagers, David Henrie and Jake T. Austin, are too young, unless our date was last year, but the Dad is played by 43-year old David DeLuise, who was doing a lot of tv shows and movies in the 1990s, when I lived in West Hollywood....

"I made out with one of the stars of Wizards of Waverly Place!" I announce.

"Really?"  Jimmy's eyes widen.  "Which one?  David Henrie?  He's so hot I can't stand it, but isn't he homophobic?  Not Jake T. Austin -- I know he's gay, but he's only -- what?  Sixteen?  I know -- Gregg Sulkin, the werewolf?"

Gregg Sulkin has a recurring role as a werewolf-boy who is dating daughter Alex.

Gulp.  He hasn't mention David DeLuise.  He must not find him attractive.  I have to pick someone else, fast!  But I don't know the names of any other male cast members.

"Yep," I say forlornly, trapped.  "It was Gregg Sulkin."

Think!  What do you know about Sulkin that will give you a narrative hook?  He's young, British -- and Jewish!  And I was just back at Beth Chaim Chadashim last summer, where I picked up a Cute Young Thing, a Jewish boy from Tennessee.  Why not make him....

West Hollywood, Summer 2013

I was back in West Hollywood visiting my old friends, going to my old hangouts.  Lane had converted to Christianity and become an Episcopalian, but for nostalgia's sake he and his partner Ben took me to a Friday night service at Beth Chaim Chadashim, the gay synagogue.

After nearly 20 years, I barely recognized anyone, but the prayers and songs were still pleasantly familiar.  I got the "new guy" treatment, with people going out of their way to be friendly -- and cruise.

As a twink magnet, I drew the attention of the young crowd, the newly out and closeted guys who were still living with conservative parents or struggling with "is it ok to be gay and Jewish?"  mishegas that the rest of us overcame years ago.  I was approached by a Cute Young Thing who introduced himself as Gregg, from London. (Rich, from Nashville).

Probably 20 years old, short but rather muscular, with a broad chest and thick biceps (short and slim, with a narrow chest and long, thin biceps).  He had big hair, a round open face, and red, feminine lips, and a cute British accent (short hair, a long face, and a Southern accent).

Suddenly I recognized him as the werewolf boy from Wizards of Waverly Place, but I played it cool. "I love London (Nashville)," I told him.  "I was there a couple of years ago.  Such an interesting history."

"L.A. is great, but I miss London (Nashville) every day.  There's just something about home that stays with you forever."

"Home for me is right here in West Hollywood," Lane said.  "I live in Orange County now, but I'm still up here a couple times a week."

Gregg turned to me.  "Where's home for you, Boomer?"

"The Great Plains, all flat prairie and super-hung farmboys.  But I'd give anything to live in West Hollywood."  I forgot to tell him that I had lived here for ten years.

"Every gay guy in the world wants to live in West Hollywood." He laughed and touched my shoulder.  Feeling its hardness, he got that dreamy half-aroused look.  "So, what are you doing tomorrow? I could show you the sights of L.A..  I can give you an insider tour of the Hollywood Center Studios (UCLA).

The next day Gregg picked me up in his 2013 Fiat (1996 Toyota) and took me on a greenhorn tour: Mann's Chinese Theater, the Walk of Fame, the Pacific Design Center, Beverly Hills, the Santa Monica pier.

Whoops, I forgot the Hollywood Center Studios.  Too much trouble.  Why didn't I stick with Nate Richert?

We had to meet Lane and Ben for dinner, so we didn't have time for the Hollywood Center Studios. But we had time to go back to Gregg's house in Burbank (tiny, cramped apartment off Fairfax). He was very passionate, into giving and receiving oral, and an anal bottom.  I don't usually do anal, but he was so hot that I obliged (I didn't).  Mortadella+ beneath the belt (average size)

Time to wrap this up.  And explain why Gregg was with me when he's had any number of girlfriends.  I invent a whole conversation:

"How long will you be in town?" Gregg asked as we cuddled in bed.

"Another three days.  Why?"

"Well, the thing is, I have a girlfriend."

I stared.  "So...um..."

"It's ok, we have an open relationship.  We're both bisexual, and we like to bring a third person in from time to time.  We hooked up with a really hot girl last weekend.  If you're into it, I was wondering if...."

No!

That was a major turn off, but at least I got to go down on the werewolf of Waverly Place.

Plains, April 2014

I'm proud of myself.  I managed to transform my date with a West Hollywood Cute Young Thing into a believable date with a contemporary tv star, on the spur of the moment, with no background research.  But I'm also feeling guilty.  I've never made up a celebrity dating story before without having at least met the guy.

"Great story!" Jimmy exclaims.  "I always thought Gregg went both ways. You know the tv star I had the biggest crush on as a kid?"

"Um...no.  Who?"

"Don't laugh -- he's not a superhunk, but he was so cute!  When I was seven or eight years old,  I was totally in love with him.  My parents said they knew I was gay because every time he came on, I was just glued to the screen."

"Well, don't keep me in suspense.  Who was it?"

"Did you ever watch Sabrina the Teenage Witch?  I had a crush on Nate Richert, who played Harvey."

The guy I was really with!  I start kicking myself.

See also: My Platonic Friends and Their Boy Toy; Nate Richert's Kielbasa; Jimmy's Date with Dylan O'Brien