I attempted to watch the Superbowl last night. Well, I attempted to watch the commercials, at least. And you know what? Either Superbowl commercials are not as good as they used to be, or I’ve just gotten older, or I watch so little TV these days that TV commercials have become a foreign language to me, or commercials are more fun when you’re watching them with other people. Most of the Superbowl commercials involved some combination of animals, bodily functions and misogyny. If I were a 14-year-old hetero teenage boy, I would have loved it. My favorite commercial (out of those I saw; I turned off the TV after the halftime show and wasn’t even looking at the TV when the infamous breast moment happened) was the one with the braying donkey who wants to be a Clydesdale horse. I also liked the one where the bear attempts to buy Pepsi with a fake ID. For some reason the idea of a bear trying to pass for a mountain man was cute.

Other than that, though, I felt like all of America was in on some joke that I just wasn’t getting. The Superbowl is one of those things that make me feel entirely alienated from the rest of the country. (This is another.)

Eventually I gave up and went back to my book (which I suspect not too many Americans are reading).

Last night I watched Soldier’s Girl, a TV movie based on the true story of U.S. Army soldier Pfc. Barry Winchell. Winchell was murdered in Tennessee by a fellow Army soldier who suspected that Winchell was gay. In reality, Winchell was in love with a pre-operative transsexual, Calpernia Addams, and therefore he didn’t fit neatly into one category.

I became intrigued by this movie after seeing a clip of it on the Golden Globes a couple of weeks ago (it received three nominations). It’s available on Netflix. It’s dramatic — simultaneously brutal and uplifting — and Lee Pace, who plays Calpernia, is terrific. I highly recommend it.

Here’s a great summary of the case that was based in part on an interview with Calpernia.

This country scares me lately.

First, Christian groups nationwide are planning to use Mel Gibson’s “The Passion of the Christ” as an evangelism tool.

I have no problem with more Christians. There’s nothing wrong with Christianity itself. What I worry about is what it all means for me as a Jew, as more and more people use Christianity as an excuse for their own fears. I particularly worry that this movie will increase anti-Semitism in the United States. I worry — and this might sound ridiculous — I worry that this country is on a path that someday, in the distant future, will lead to Jews becoming second-class citizens. Perhaps even rounded up. Yeah, it might sound ridiculous — a stereotypical Jewish fear, this fear of another Holocaust. But hey, it couldn’t happen in Germany, right? The German Jews were proud, patriotic Germans. Who’d want to hurt them?

I’m not saying this will happen in five years or even in 20 years. But in 40 or 50 years? Who knows. What will happen in this country in coming decades? Change come fast and change come slow. You can’t always see it happening. You tolerate small adjustments, and then more small adjustments, and then one day — due to international events, economic downturns, changes in technology and communication — you’re living in a completely different world. Look at how things have changed in just the last three years. Now multiply that by 10 or 20.

The other reason this country scares me is that following yesterday’s clarification by the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts that gay marriage means gay marriage, opponents have vowed that it will galvanize their push for a anti-gay-marriage federal constitutional amendment. Maybe I should feel happy that I live in a nation in which a state’s highest court can declare gay marriage a constitutional right. I am, somewhat. But I’m nervous about the backlash.

Fear is so powerful. Adults — adults who hold jobs and own homes and drive cars and raise children — turn into children. Why are people so afraid of change? Why do human beings always act this way, in every country on Earth and in every time period in history?

Americans aren’t special. This nation was founded on tolerance, but look at the intolerance of the Puritans. Look at the Know-Nothings. Slavery. The Red Scare. McCarthyism.

Americans are no better than anyone else.

Here’s a really interesting debate about gay marriage. There are some great comments there (and some stupid ones). The more I read that page, the more I find that the gender of the partners isn’t really an interesting issue. The more interesting issue is what types of relationship should be allowed for any couples, gay or straight: civil marriages, civil unions, nothing, something completely different.

The gender of the partners is pretty boring. I wish more people felt this way.

Holy cow. Dan Savage himself has left a comment on the gay marriage thread I linked to yesterday.

I would love to see this happen. It could be one of those stories that’s just being hyped up to create drama, but it sure would make things easier for the Democrats this year.

THE HOTTIE DEFENSE: Judge Found Cop’s Looks Were So Good, They Aided Entrapment

Me: i guess since it’s a finding of fact, an appeals court can’t overrule him being attractive
Friend: LOL
Me: it would be great if they had to write briefs on that subject
Friend: In an En Banc decision The US Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit finds plain error: You are UGLY.
Friend: Or make him appear in briefs
Me: LOL
Me: plain error: You are UGLY. i love that
Me: then future lawyers could cite the case.
Me: “Excuse me, your honor, but my adversary’s client is ugly. See Smith v. Jones (11th Circ. 2003).”
Friend: LOL
Friend: It would be a question for the jury
Friend: Judge’s instructions: Finding of Fact: Is the arresting officer Hot or Not?

DontGiveToUVA.com

There’s a movement at my alma mater to convince the administrators to start offering domestic partnership benefits.

Nearly every other top university in the United States (Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Berkeley, Michigan – even Washington and Lee!) currently offers domestic partner benefits. But not U.Va.

We established DontGiveToUVA.com to pressure U.Va. administrators to finally do the right thing and offer domestic partner benefits. The money we raise will go to the U.Va. employees who must pay for their partners’ benefits themselves.

I hope they do the right thing.

Matt and I spent today in Brooklyn. We wanted to go to the MTA Transit Museum, because neither of us had ever been there before, so that’s what we did.

The Transit Museum is located in an old subway station in Brooklyn Heights, and it’s much bigger than either of us had expected. The main level has exhibits on the building of the subway system, the old elevated trains, the bus system, the history of public transportation in New York, and a collection of old turnstiles that still worked — including a recently obsolete subway turnstile that takes Metrocards and has a token slot as well. The bottom level — where the subway tracks are — contains two rows of old subway cars that you can walk through. The Transit Museum is a must-see for anyone intererested in the history of New York City.

After leaving the museum, we were hungry, so at my suggestion, after walking through the outdoor Fulton Mall, we had a late lunch at Junior’s, a Brooklyn institution with the best cheesecake in the world. After seating you, they give you beets, pickles, cole slaw, rolls and corn bread — oh, and menus. We each had a burger (Matt’s had muenster cheese and mushrooms) and the tastiest onion rings ever: they’re thick and bready, like hushpuppies wrapped around strips of onion. Yum.

And, then, of course, the cheesecake. I ordered chocolate swirl cheesecake, and Matt ordered chocolate mousse cheesecake. “Have you had it before?” the waitress said. “No,” Matt said. “You’re in for a treat,” she said.

A few minutes later she brought out our plates.

My plate had a substantial slice of cheesecake on it. It looked pretty yummy.

Matt’s plate had the most incredibly enormous slab of cheesecake I’d ever seen.

It was half regular cheesecake, half chocolate cheesecake, and the end was a layer of chocolate covered — covered — with chocolate chips. He and I could have split it with two or three other people. I had a few bites of it, and let me tell you — it was pretty amazing.

He was going to try to finish the whole thing, but I stopped him because I was near bursting and I just couldn’t bear to watch. (I also didn’t want my boyfriend getting a tummyache.)

Hmm… what are we gonna have for dinner?

George W. Bush was awful on “Meet the Press” this morning. I kept watching him, thinking, is this really the president of the United States? He basically repeated himself for an hour. In trying to justify the war against Iraq and Saddam, he said “dangerous” 12 times, “danger” five times, and “madman” six times.

He’s incapable of complex, nuanced thought. We’ve known this for a while, but to actually see it happening was fascinating. He must be a lucky man to live in such a simple world with no gray areas. I felt both anger and sadness for the guy: anger because he’s throwing our country into the toilet, and sadness because, despite being 57 years old, he has no grip on reality. He’s a terrible off-the-cuff speaker, but that’s only partly due to his presentation; it’s his lack of content that makes him so rotten. He has nothing to say. Nothing. No thoughts, no logic. He talks in circles. Does he actually expect people to buy his empty, lame rhetoric?

Well, maybe they will. After the first Bush vs. Gore debate four years ago, I was happy because I felt Gore had won. Bush had blathered nonsense for an hour and a half while Gore had refuted almost all of that nonsense by making clear, logical, cogent points backed up by evidence. I was so psyched, and I thought Gore would start rising in the polls. But it turned out that all of America was focusing on Gore’s exhalations of breath. Ever since then, I’ve avoided trying to predict public opinion.

I won’t change my philosophy or my point of view. I believe I owe it to the American people to say what I’m going to do and do it, and to speak as clearly as I can, try to articulate as best I can why I make decisions I make, but I’m not going to change because of polls.

Or because of facts, apparently.

I don’t think George W. Bush is evil. I think that in his head, he really believes what he’s saying. He has a few overriding principles: Saddam bad. Taxes bad. America good. Part of me thinks he’ll stick to these beliefs even if it means losing the election. That’s honorable, in a way.

But he’ll also stick to these beliefs even if facts get in the way. And that’s scary.

Especially if he wins.

It’s going to be gay marriage again today, because it’s a topic that fascinates me.

Dan Kennedy of the Boston Phoenix writes today on the Massachusetts gay marriage debate:

State Senator Michael Morrissey put it this way in a Globe interview: “The question is, what’s more democratic than putting a question on the ballot? Isn’t that democratic?”

The legislature is there to protect the rights of the minority. The drafters of the state constitution – headed by John Adams – gave an explicit role to the legislature so that our elected officials could exercise their considered judgment as to whether a proposed amendment might do so much damage that it should not even be considered by the voters. Only after legislators have had a chance to reflect – twice – is an amendment to go before the public.

I agree. Except that legislators want to be re-elected, so the barrier between a legislator and his or her constituents is not very big. That’s why judges are more effective guardians of minority rights; they’re not subject to the popular will. Unfortunately, as Kennedy points out, it’s comparatively easy to amend the Massachusetts Constitution: all you need are a few wins by a simple majority, not by 2/3 or 3/4 of the voters. That’s hardly a way to achieve consensus. It should be more difficult to amend a constitution.

I don’t see why opponents of gay marriage should get to vote on something that doesn’t affect them.

The Boston Phoenix has a SLEW of gay marriage links here.

Faces of Family: photographs of gay couples. And some are way cute.

A year ago today, I resumed blogging after a year away from it.

Has it really been a year? So much has happened.

So I’m coming back — on a tentative basis.

Er, I guess it’s not so tentative anymore. I don’t plan on quitting again anytime soon.

Today, a joint session of both houses of the Massachusetts legislature is holding a constitutional convention in which it is going to vote on several proposed constitutional amendments related to gay marriage. I’ve been following this on and off today.

Full Faith and Credulous.

It’s a truism to say that one of the great beauties of federalism is that states can act as mini-social-laboratories…. To amend the Constitution before the courts have even ruled on DOMA is to give in to pre-emptive hysteria… It calls out only one signal: that even one gay marriage in one small state is too many. That’s not statesmanship, and it’s not political policy. It’s bigotry.

Right on.

Last night Matt and I had dinner at the Heartland Brewery in Union Square. When I turned my head to find the waiter so that he could bring us a dessert menu, I noticed Chris Parnell of “Saturday Night Live” sitting at a nearby table. He was wearing an unfashionable green-and-blue plaid button-down shirt and there was a woman with him. They were eating and talking. They seemed absorbed in conversation. He looked like just another regular guy eating dinner.

I don’t care what they say about New Yorkers being blasé about celebrities. I’ll always be a starfucker.

Hooray! My letter got printed in the Cavalier Daily today.

I received an e-mail from my dad on Friday evening with the subject heading, “Congratulations.” I figured that since I hadn’t yet spoken with him directly about my having a boyfriend, he was writing to congratulate me on that.

But no, that’s not what he was congratulating me on. The e-mail said: “Your blog made it on to Google. BTW do you know that Heartland Brewery is owned by a member of your family?”

I did know that. My third cousin (or something like that) owns the Heartland Brewery chain. That’s not my point here, though.

Upon reading my dad’s e-mail, my first thought was: Wait. My blog’s been on Google for months, ever since I removed the source code preventing search engine bots from logging my site. My second thought was: How the heck did he find my site? I’ve always been careful not to use my full name here, so that my blog wouldn’t show up in a Google search of my name.

Until I wrote this.

Originally, I’d included my whole name in that entry. I’d cut-and-pasted the entire text of the letter into my blog without even thinking about it. Sure enough, after reading my dad’s e-mail, I typed my name into Google and my blog was the first thing that came up. After just two days! Damn, Google’s fast.

I think I’d mentioned to my parents a couple of years ago that I had a “website on which I write about stuff going on in my life,” but I’d never been sure whether or not they knew the URL. I don’t know why I’ve cared. I’m 30 years old now, and it’s not like I should have anything to hide from them. I’m less comfortable with anyone from work Googling me and finding my site, however, so I’ve corrected the entry linked above. And already, my site doesn’t come up anymore if you Google me.

The Google giveth, and the Google taketh away.

I wrote my dad back, saying, in part, “How often do you type my name into Google?” He wrote back that he was searching for Chris Parnell.

Except that my referral stats show no links from a Google search of Chris Parnell.

My referral stats do, however, show a link from a Google search of my name.

And it was done from a computer at my dad’s company.

Maybe he meant “I was searching for Chris Parnell” as a joke.

That’s what I’ll keep telling myself, anyway.

I just came off a five-day weekend. We got last Thursday off for Lincoln’s birthday and yesterday off for Washington’s birthday, so I decided to make it one long break by taking Friday off as a vacation day. It was terrific, even though my boyfriend has rolled his eyes several times at my excessive job perks. (He’s cute when he rolls his eyes.) I wound up spending lots of time with the aforementioned boyfriend; Matt and I had quite a social weekend, with lots of dining out. On Friday night we went to a tiny French restaurant here in Jersey City called Madame Claude. The food was so terrific, better than I could have imagined, and Matt’s chocolate mousse dessert was the best chocolate mousse I’d ever tasted. Toward the end of our meal, the couple next to us, out of the blue, poured each of us an extra glass of wine from the bottle they’d brought, as if we weren’t roasted and toasted enough already.

That was essentially our Valentine’s dinner. On Saturday night, the actual Valentine’s Day, we saw the Encores production of Can-Can, which, except for Patti Lupone, was pretty bad. (It didn’t help that we were way up in the nosebleed seats — though they did cost us only $15 each.) Afterwards, we went out for a beer with my friend Jere, who was also at the show (and who is currently guest-blogging here. Matt had never met him before. They traded expert opinions about theater back and forth while I tried to keep up.

Sunday morning Matt and I had brunch at Chat ‘n’ Chew with Thom and Jeff, who were visiting from DC. They’re a totally cute and sweet couple, and after reading them these last few months it was great to finally meet them. (I had a great meal, too — blueberry pancakes with fresh blueberries, and a big dish of sweet potatoes fries split with Matt.)

Then, last night, we went out to Brooklyn to meet my friends Sara and Shay, who live in Carroll Gardens. We ate a French restaurant on Smith Street called Bar Tabac. More delicious food, and more terrific company.

In the last few days we’ve eaten like kings and socialized like queens.

I don’t even know what that last part means, but it sounded funny when it entered my brain.

Here’s to long weekends!

(And of course, right after posting this entry, I see that Matt has already blogged about it.)

Product Warning Labels for Physicists.

After watching tonight’s Angel, I’m really scared of seeing Avenue Q again anytime soon.

Aggghh!!! Head for the hills!!! It’s the Attack of the Gay Agenda!!!!

Something happened to me last night and I’m still disturbed by it.

I was walking home from the PATH station when I saw a group of four or five boys ahead, standing in front of an apartment complex. They were 13, maybe 14 years old. I usually walk home along the other side of the street, but last night I happened to be walking on their side. These kids have bothered me before: on Halloween evening they threw an egg across the street at me and hit my backpack, and one evening this winter someone threw a snowball at me (and missed). Total losers with nothing better to do than bother people. The night they hit me with the egg, I actually turned around and started to run after them, but they ran away yelling, “Oh, shit!”

So last night I was walking along and I saw them ahead. I decided I was going to ignore them, but then two of them started taunting me and walking after me. They were asking why my pants were so tight, which they weren’t. “Aren’t they huggin’ your nuts?” they said. They weren’t, but I guess anything looks tight to kids who wear jeans that ride halfway down their asses.

Then they asked why I was walking away so fast.

For some reason — maybe I thought that if I were friendly with them they’d think I was cool and leave me alone, or maybe I could hear my dad’s or my brother’s voice in my ear telling me not to be a wimp — I stopped and turned around. They were about my height (I’m 5’6″).

I said, “I’m going home to watch Friends.” I was trying to use a cool, relaxed intonation. It was almost 8:00.

One of them said, “Friends is on at 7 and 11, yo.”

I said, “Those are the old ones. The new ones are Thursdays at 8.”

Then the other one said that I had big eyebrows.

When confronted by someone trying to insult me, I sometimes decide to agree with them, in order to throw them off, defuse the situation and take away their ammunition. “Yeah, they kinda need to be trimmed, don’t they,” I said, laughing.

Then he said my jacket wasn’t real leather. “What are you talking about? Of course it is,” I said.

Then the other one looked at my scarf and said, “My grandma gave that scarf to the Salvation Army.” My 100% cashmere scarf. I said, “Yeah, that’s where I got it.”

They said that my glasses were sliding down my nose, and (worse) they noticed that I was holding a book, which I’d been reading on the train.

“You get girls, man?” they said.

Then I did something that I hate to do — I lied about my sexual orientation.

“Yeah,” I said.

“How many?”

I shrugged. “I get some.”

“No you don’t. You’re a geek.”

“Yeah, I am,” I said. “Girls like geeks.”

“You gay?”

“No,” I said, swallowing my pride.

“You got a girlfriend?”

“Not right now,” I said, a little awkwardly.

Then one of them pointed at my book. “What book is that?”

It was Civil Wars: A Battle For Gay Marriage, so I didn’t want to show it to them. It didn’t have a book jacket but the name was printed on the spine.

“It’s just a book,” I said.

“You don’t want to show it to me?”

“No.”

He put his hand on it and I tried to pull it away from him but he grasped it harder.

“I’m not gonna take it from you, I just wanna see it,” he said.

“It’s my book,” I said. “I gotta go.” So I pulled it out of his hand and walked away, crossing to the other side of the street. I heard him joke that he had a glock (a type of machine gun, I think) in his jacket.

Then he threw a big pebble at me. It missed.

So much for my trying to win them over.

Assholes.

Then they stopped bothering me and I continued walking home.

But I was really angry. And I’m still angry. I couldn’t stop thinking about it last night, even though I wanted to. I was in my safe, nice apartment, but it kept invading the sanctuary of my thoughts. I kept thinking about it and feeling nervous and unsafe.

Part of it is that I got mugged two years ago, and this probably evoked some of those feelings.

But it also gave me flashbacks to middle school, back when I really was a frizzy-haired nerd who had skipped seventh grade, none of which ever endeared me to the cool kids. And here I was last night, a short guy with glasses, walking home carrying a book, totally unfamiliar with whatever passes for “cool” among teenagers today, and I was being taunted. Again. Like I was back in middle school. I was so pissed off. I’m 30 years old and I’m not supposed to have to put up with this shit anymore. I’m supposed to be a different person now, an adult, with greater self-esteem. Part of me was thinking, how can you guys see through my facade? Why won’t you let me move on with my life? Why are you trying to haunt me? Why are you trying to drag me back into your world? Why me? What the fuck do you have against me? Can’t I ever escape from this crap?

I’m also a little nervous because I walk home along that street every evening after work. (Fortunately, I live next to a police station.) For all I know, one of them has a switchblade or a gun or something at home. Doubtful, but who knows. I’m not going to start walking along a different street, though. In fact, I want to forget the conversation ever happened. I’m just going to start ignoring them. I want to make as little an impression on them as possible. It’s weird — they’re only 13 or 14 years old and yet I’m kinda scared.

I can’t believe I am letting myself be scared by kids.

Anyway, this morning I was riding the train to work, surrounded by adults commuting to their jobs, and I felt at home again. Among adults.

Thank goodness I’m an adult now. Thank goodness I don’t have to put up with that shit anymore. Thank goodness adults don’t act like that.

Well, except for, you know, the ones who want me to burn in hell because I’m gay.

And of course the racists and the xenophobes.

And don’t forget the anti-Semites.

Oh, and all those who make themselves feel better by picking other people.

What was I saying again? Oh, yeah. Thank goodness adults don’t act like that.

Gay marriage has spread to New Mexico.

I swear, this is all starting to remind me of Eastern Europe in 1989. First it happens in one place, and then it starts to spread. This is so exciting.

(Postscript: er, never mind.)

Last night, Matt and I went to see Valhalla, Paul Rudnick’s newest play. As we entered the lobby, I saw three people standing together, and I realized that one of them was Nathan Lane. I leaned close to Matt and said, very softly, “Nathan Lane is behind you.”

We went in and took our seats. After a few minutes, I got up to use the restroom. The men’s room had a long line. As I was waiting, Nathan Lane walked out. Wow! Nathan Lane just peed in one of those urinals! I thought.

When I went back into the theater, I was going to tell Matt that I’d seen Nathan Lane coming out of the restroom. Matt was looking at me with an interesting look on his face, like he was trying to tell me something. I climbed over a few people to return to my seat, and then I followed Matt’s gesture and noticed that NATHAN LANE WAS SITTING RIGHT IN FRONT OF US. His two guests were on opposite sides of him, maybe to create a buffer zone. Matt had been trying silently to warn me of his presence so I wouldn’t start talking about him.

Anyway, since he was sitting directly in front of Matt, and not directly in front of me, I could sort of see his face. I was looking forward to gauging his reactions to the play, since it was a comedy and he specializes in comedic roles. (In fact, he had a role in the movie version of Paul Rudnick’s play, Jeffrey.)

I watching him on and off during the show. The play was fun and funny, and he laughed out loud several times. There were a few times when actors would recite lines from the back of the audience, and I noticed that he never turned around to look at them. He probably didn’t want to be seen.

And of course during intermission I went outside and called my mom to tell her.

At the end of the show, he and his companions got on their coats and walked out. I was sort of staring at him, and I think one of his companions noticed, because as she glanced at me, I saw a hint of a grin on her face.

(Here’s Matt’s account.)

You know, it feels strange to see the issue of gay rights dominating the newspapers today. It shouldn’t feel strange, but it does. This happens every time there’s a major gay story in the news — gays in the military, Ellen DeGeneres, Matthew Shepard, Lawrence v. Texas; I see the word GAY in bold print on the front page of the New York Times or on the cover of Time magazine and it gives me cognitive dissonance.

Here’s this concept that has been a part of me ever since puberty. I never connected it to anything in the news; I didn’t know anyone else who felt this way. Homosexuality knew me intimately, knew my darkest thoughts, and I didn’t share it with a soul. We had a monogamous relationship; it was my secret companion. My Snuffleupagus.

And now it’s in the news every day, and all of America is talking about it. In fact, a large segment of America is obsessing over it.

It’s jarring at times. It’s like how you’d feel if one day everyone on national TV starting talking about your hometown, or if you suddenly saw a picture of your imaginary childhood friend on the front page of the newspaper. Huh? How could the whole country possibly be interested in something that is something so privately mine? The world has never been interested in the same things as I am. Until this.

At times, it’s a good feeling. At least people are unafraid to talk about this part of my life now. Maybe some good will come of it.

But that doesn’t make it any less strange.

Michael Signorile on the Bush Administration’s “Wag the Fag” strategy:

“Two years ago it was Afghanistan. Last year it was Iraq. This year? Massachusetts, San Francisco, and Sandoval County, New Mexico — the all-new ‘axis of evil.'”

I’m finally introducing Matt to my parents this weekend.

The occasion happens to be a little brunch with my family to celebrate my mom’s birthday.

Should he bring anything for my mom, whom he’s never met? If so, what? We’re both trying to figure this one out.

“Or, and this is a real possibility, we could see President Bush giving his acceptance speech at Ground Zero,” he added. “It’s clearly a venue they’re considering.”

Ugh. (scroll down to second article)