Of Pride and Porn.
So Poornima Muralidhur (known to many of you Burghers as Porn, or Loud American Porn), my bestest girly friend in the entire world, came out from Toronto to visit me last weekend. It was off the chain, the hook, the entire metal apparatus...we just had the most amazing time! First was a delicious dinner at Cha Cha Cha's, Sangria included. Then we headed to SF Gay Pride 08, which began with an Edinburgh Debbie organized night at Booty, a mash-up night. My favorites of the night were '99 Problems' mixed with '99 Luftballoons,' and 'D.A.N.C.E.' with 'Let's Dance.' The drag show was AMAZING! I can't quite believe that I'm 25 and have never seen one before, but I thought it was so much fun! Some of the drag queens were absolutely beautiful, I remember Debbie and I wishing we had legs like those uber-tall divas. After much dancing with Brian, Hugh, and Glenn, we meandered over to the Castro which was INSANE at such an hour, people vomiting in the streets and way too many frat boys for a fest like this. We circled back on Market St to Lucky 13, just in time for closing where we had our last pride pint with Matt. When we woke the next morning the festival was still going on! We drunkenly slept right though the parade so we headed down to Civic Center to get some buttons. I was wearing this yellow dress from Wasteland (Porn and I both bought one), and people kept sticking Obama stickers on my yellow back. Got harassed by straight guys, which is kind of hilarious. I think maybe Pride has lost its meaning for a lot of San Franciscans, but at least I got an awesome Obama '08 pin with a Hawaii-style rainbow on it. We also got designer bags laminated with newspaper clippings, Porn's with a '1987 Life Magazine' and mine with an 'SF Chronicle' featuring Sean Connery. Headed into Golden Gate Park for an actual surrey ride, still in the Yellow Dress Porn wanted desperatly to North Beach so we went to the Stinking Rose, where I got Stinking Sick., no kidding I was actually terribly ill. Guess no garlic for me anymore! I went to work on Monday as Porn worked on her uber important computer code stuff for her Toronto job. Met up again at 3:00 for a delicious Greek lunch at the Mediterranean, and to see the Frida Kahlo exhibit at SFMOMA. The audio tour was SO worth it, since it was no longer purely audio but actually had a wee video IPOD with tons of archival footage of the artists, special features, etc! I <3 technology, even if it involves pissing off other art lookers who had to listen to the babies screaming because it was so mobbed in there. My favorite painting was 'The Two Fridas,' it really seemed to capture the pain of abandonment that she faced her entire life with Diego Rivera. Anthropologie was next where we bought some dear-looking skirts for way too much money.We went out to some Salvadorean cuisine in the mission and shopping of course. Then it was the good old Edinburgh castle, where we played 17(!) songs on the brilliant jukebox they have there and participated in darts with Glenn and Brian. A restful sleep ensued, after watching the 'Boring' episode of the Young Ones. ('Cornflakes! Cornflakes! Cornflakes! Cornflakes! Cornflakes! Cornflakes, Cornflakes, Cornflakes, Corn-FLAKES!') The next day was moving day. I decided last month to spend the last month in Cali at home in Walnut Creek, in order to save on rent. Porn and I woke early and got the matress out for free with SF Recyling, then cleaned the entire room! We were listening to her tour CD of Sun City Girls, which I think is excellent. Went shopping at Amoeba where I got the Deltron 3030 CD, finally re-released after five years of being unavaliable due to the label it was on going tits-up. Also a 10.00 DVD of 'Bad Education,' my fave Almodovar film. Went to Villians (Porn was not impressed) and back to Wasteland, before ending up at Citrus Club for some amazing Thai Food. After such an amazing weekend, it was time to say goodybe. I wept as we went through all the Mighty Boosh crimps on the bus like the Geeks that we are. 'Alan, alan, alan, alan ickle spider provider, don't get caught in his web.' It was surreal and beautiful and could have only happened with my girl. As I went back on the BART to sleep in my Walnut Creek bed, I reminisced on how lucky I was to have friends like mine. A new chapter in my life is starting as a PHD student in Hawaii, but I'm so glad I could say goodbye to SF with Porn.