More to the point, summer ended with a lovely weekend outdoors.  

Some visual foreshadowing above Lake Absegami. The cloud fish foretold of my...

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...reeling in a keeper moments later.

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*[photos via coasttocoastam.com, cryptomundo.com, and me]

Douglas Perry
The Girls of Murder City: Fame, Lust, and the Beautiful Killers Who Inspired ‘Chicago’
(Viking, 2010)

Close on the heels of Deborah Blum’s The Poisoner’s Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York (Penguin, 2010), comes Douglas Perry’s true crime history The Girls of Murder City: Fame, Lust, and the Beautiful Killers Who Inspired Chicago, which turned out to be a welcome companion piece.

The former is a dissection of New York City’s use and rapid improvement of nascent forensic medical techniques during the Prohibition era.  Murder after murder is lovingly recreated—especially those involving poisons—and then deconstructed by über CSI experts. The latter book takes us to Prohibition-era Chi-town, where the weapon of choice wasn’t poison but pistols, and the bad guys were bad gals.    **CONT’D HERE>>

On second thought, I see a doddering old man with a cane wearing a yellow or khaki colored cap walking on a path along the riverbank.  Rats.

(Absurd how if two humans go by in a boat the Bigfoot community can’t first assume that a third figure enjoying the scenery from the shore might also be a human.  This is a well-traveled area.  It might not be Grand Central Station but it’s a well-traveled area.)

"Everyone knows how against cocaine I am." Yeah, right up against it. So close she leans on it.

Maybe Paris Hilton’s Bible was hollowed out and that’s where she kept her coke; you know, the Bible she started conspicuously sporting  as a fashion accessory just before her sentencing 3 years ago for a parole violation related to a drunk-driving charge?  She carried around that and a copy of The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment, both of which I’m guessing she traded for Oil of Olay and skin oranger as soon as she wound up in the big house. 

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I wonder if she’ll buy new copies to carry during her October 27th court appearance for being caught with blow last Friday night.

I’ll be holding a special prayer brunch for Paris this Sunday right after church.  If you can’t attend you can still join in by praying the Paris Prayer with me at exactly 1pm EST:  God, grant me the Percocets to accept the things I cannot change, the cash to change the things I can, and the lawyer to know the loopholes.  Amen.

 [photos via bestweekever.tv and speedselling.com]

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From Youtube’s lefthandedart.  “A man walks through the crowd at the Ground Zero protest and is mistaken as a Muslim. The crowd turns on him and confronts him. The man in the blue hard hat calls him a coward and tries to fight him. The tall man who I think was one of the organizers tried to get between the two men. Later  caught up with the man who’s name is Kenny. He is a Union carpenter who works at Ground Zero. We discussed what a scary moment that was for him. I told him that I hoped it did not ruin his day.”

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Now for sale, Jefe’s Rubber Crosses for Rubber KKKhristians. They Bend! Collect all 4. Celtic, Latin, St. Anthony’s and Patriarchal!  

1. ’You shall have no other gods before Me.’

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2. ‘You shall not make for yourself a carved image — any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.’  

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3. ’You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.’
 

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4. ‘Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.’
Except for skipping church to honor our Lord at a protest, like on Sunday, August 22, 2010.

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5. ’Honor your father and your mother.’
Just don’t honor anyone else’s fathers and mothers, especially the dozens of Muslim civilians who worked in the Twin Towers and were killed on 9/11, plus at least 8 others who were killed in the US in hate crimes in the days and weeks afterward who were either Muslim or just “looked Middle Eastern.”  In fact it only took 3 days for these lunatics’ protesting to spark another attempted hate-crime murder right here in so-called ultra-liberal Manhattan.  Three guesses as to alleged stabber Michael Enright’s religious indoctrination… I’m sure the KKKhristian cowards are jumping for joy and labeling this alleged scum a hero.

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 6. ’You shall not kill.’

Well, yeah but, I mean — You’re not serious are You? I mean we have to murder sometimes. Okay we have to murder a lot. Oh hell, look, if we’re gonna prevail we’re gonna have to be come the most bloodthirsty religion on Earth so we’re just gonna do a strike-through on #6, okay? There.

“How grateful I am to Almighty God [which god is he talking about here? Jesus? Come on.]…The Japanese have seen what our atomic bomb can do [kill 200,000 civilians]…we shall continue to use it…They have been repaid many fold. And the end is not yet.” – President Truman, August 6 and 9, 1945

 [Fine and dandy if you support dropping the bombs but please don't kid yourself and call it KKKhristian, or if you do, acknowledge that your KKKhristianity, not Islam, is the most homicidal religion on Earth.]

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7. ’You shall not commit adultery.’
King David, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, MLK, Jimmy Swaggert, Jim and Tammy Bakker, don’t even get me started.  

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8.  ‘You shall not steal.’
The land now called the United States of America, taken by KKKhristians because they claim their god told them it was their destiny and had been set aside for them, and to kill, kill, kill anything in their way (see Commandment #6).  The sacred ground of lower Manhattan was stolen, I mean ”bought,” by KKKhristian Peter Minuit from the original settlers for a load of cloth, beads and hatchets worth about $72 in today’s money — the greatest land swindle in history.

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9.  ‘You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.’
Except when convenient to your cause and when making protest signs. Then it’s okay to paint all of your Muslim neighbors as violent extremists and live in denial that Sharia Law doesn’t hold a candle to your own intolerant religion which is the most murderous in human history.  Thank God we have a secular nation and secular laws that keep the lunatics pictured left from taking over.  [And for the record, Sharia Law scares the bejesus outta me, too. I wouldn't want to live under it, and fortunately it has nothing to do with the mosque being built in Lower Manhattan any more than Mosaic law has to do with Judaism and Christianity.]

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10. ’You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbor’s.’
Whew! It doesn’t say anything about oil.  And about the ground where my neighbor wants to build his house of worship which I have suddenly deem sacred while other nearby sacred ground containing churches, shopping, strip clubs and liquor stores shall be ignored because KKKhristians like that stuff and its convenient.

The 10 Commandments were later recapped by a god from the KKKhristian pantheon named Jesus:  “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ [but don't be afraid to hate and stereotype all Muslims and anyone not white; let your bigotry trump all else in your heart, soul and mind].  This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”  [except for neighbors who are Muslim or Middle Eastern looking, and except for when they want to be neighbors with Ground Zero, former site of a temple of commerce, a Tower of Babel which the capitalist, cash-obsessed KKKhristians have claimed as their holy ground, just steps from the Woolworth Building, once also the tallest building in the world, designed like a church and dubbed by its creator "the Cathedral of Commerce"; see Commandment #1, 'You shall have no other gods before me.']. 

Just in case I’m not clear:  KKKhristians, stop claiming ownership of Ground Zero. I was here on 9/11, I live here, I saw it happen, I saw the bodies spewing out from that black and burning sky-high hole like eraser dust. It is indeed sacred ground, holy ground, but not yours.  It was a secular event, a Capitalist target and we are and always have been a multicultural nation.   The terrorists didn’t attack a church, mosque or synagogue on 9/11.  They chose to attack a center of business.  Honor our Constitutition rather than letting your bigotry get the better of you.  If fanatics on both sides manage to stop the Cordoba House project from going forward then, I hate to use this hackneyed phrase, the terrorists have already won.

If you’re a true Christian who truly honors the rules of your own religion and the actual teachings of Christ then ignore this post, it doesn’t apply to you. You know the kind of rabid, hateful, false KKKhristians I’m talking about; thank your lucky stars (or your God) that you’re not one of them. You have my utmost respect.

[video via youtube; photos via usflag.org, indiatone.com, statuesplus.com, current.com, fotki.com, pyschologytoday.com, monstersandcritics.com; 10 Commandments via the Holy Bible]

Shareholders weigh in on Target and Best Buy’s political giving

"Respect a bear's space."

And from Boston on to a few days in New Hampshire for a visit to my favorite fishing spot that’s always teeming with wild brook trout, keeper after keeper, day after day. 

One can spend hours in
this
narrow

mountain gorge hopscotching up the rocks in the middle of the stream and throwing a line in to fish each hole and never see another person. 

For obvious reasons the exact location must remain a secret

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betwixt me and the trees. 

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I could tell you,

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but then

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I’d have to thrill you.

Slow men at work near Fenway Park.

Unless one wants to see Jersey Boys the theatre scene seems to be on hiatus in Boston during late July and early August but that’s okay, there’s plenty of street theatre everywhere one looks.

I’ve spent the past few days in Beantown, my first time here in at least ten years, and have enjoyed seeking out alternatives to the usual sights like the “Glory monument,” Beacon Hill, the Old South Church, the Old North Church, and Faneuil Hall. If you’ve never seen these nation-making locales (and reminders of our genocide about which residents of this so-called bastion of liberalism still live in a deep, dark denial) then  make them your first order of business when you come to Boston.

Bosch.

If you’ve seen them, then consider something off the tourist trolley line like the Museum of Fine Arts and its extensive collection of mummies and 15th century Flemish religious paintings, the kind that, with their vibrant colors and expressive faces, look like they were painted yesterday for a graphic novel. 

There’s also the Mapparium at Christian Scientist headquarters, a 3-story stained glass globe built in 1935 that one enters through a gangplank and explores from the inside.

Okay, I confess I did buy a ticket for one of the trolley tours. They’re an easy way to get around the city and take in a few sights at the same time.  While waiting in line to board I heard the dad of a Red Sox apparel-clad family say “…blah blah blah Roanoke blah blah blah.”  I asked if he was from Roanoke, Virginia, my hometown, and he said yes.  I reminisced with him and his wife about the world’s largest man-made star and the world’s smallest Graceland before they departed with their kids at the first stop, Fenway Park. 

I rode the whole loop but by 3/4s through the ride the trolley had become completely empty except for me. It was rush hour and we were crawling so the driver-guide asked if I’d mind our skipping the last three historic site stops so he could take me straight back to the final stop and knock off for the day. I told him no prob, and as a result I got my own private trolley tour of sites not on their usual  itinerary, like the location of the 1950 Brinks armored car robbery, the 1919 molasses flood and the Crispus Attucks monument on Boston Common.

I also recommend the Back Bay Fens which I discovered this trip by accident. It’s a low-lying park that I understand was started as a victory garden during WW II.

Turns out that fen is an old Dutch word meaning wetland, so the fens were the low-lying swampy areas of old Boston.

Fenway Park was built on top of it, hence the name, similar to how the Meadowlands sports complex was built on top of, you guessed it, the swampy Meadowlands in Secaucus, NJ. Today the remaining fens are the Back Bay Fens, a park, gigantic community garden and outdoor sex club as I discovered.  I spent the afternoon strolling up one narrow lane and down the next, digging the way each tenant had made her or his padlocked plot of land unique from the others. 

A few couples strolled about, elds creeped around within their plots maintaining their lush gardens.

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Graffiti accurately warns of mature content in the Back Bay Fens.

Unfortunately plenty of perverts lurked, and occasional telltale condoms littered the narrow pathways. Is this really necessary?  What is up with these lusty loners? Please note that I am not calling all homosexuals perverts. I am calling grown men aging from 16 to 65 who have nothing better to do on a weekday afternoon than stand blank-faced at the end of each garden aisle staring straight ahead hoping to be approached for a quick bushwack, all the while knowing that tourists, kids and old folks are within 5 feet of them, perverts. This is some kind of bizarre, naughty, juvenile exhibitionism for which they should seek help, and goes far beyond the simple fact that they’re gay. 

I heard one such gray old daddy lecturing a younger bushwacker at the end of one of the paths as I walked past: “…between two consenting adults where nobody can see them [au contraire, mon frere] is nobody’s business, and if they can see us out their window, well they need to just…” and then I had passed out of earshot.

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Boston's own fruited plain.

I guess there’s been some trouble lately from the gay and straight residents along the fens who are sick of being the exhibitionist pervs’ condom clean-up crew every morning. Get a room already, fellas. Hell, get a car, anything. Whatever happened to the handy phrase, “Wanna come back to my place?”

I am perplexed by this strange minority of fetishists and their fixation on the woods. It’s the same with Central Park’s Ramble, which, even during the Roaring ’20s was known as the “Fruited Plain” because of its popularity as a cruising pasture.  Forest cruising also goes on in Central Park’s North Woods, which I jog through regularly while trying my best to ignore the scarecrow men standing just off the trails in the middle of the weeds like motion-sensitive animatronic zombies waiting to spring to life and start creeping towards any male who jogs past. This outdoor hobby is also rampant in sections of Philadelphia’s Fairmount Park. If you’re an urban trail runner you know what I’m talking about; it’s inevitable that you’ve encountered this special brand of muggle. 

Mind you, these urban forest retreats are in gay-friendly metropoli where gay bars and communities abound, so what’s the thrill of lurking in the woods hoping to get a quick lay on the bare ground behind a rose bush with a passing stranger just yards from families, school children and tourists? These aren’t just gay men, they’ve got some other thing going on inside. Perhaps they don’t want their wives/husbands/boyfriends/girlfriends/partners finding out? They like the naughtiness? They’re unabashed, unrepentant sex addicts? What is it? Is there anything about this in the Kinsey Report?  If you know anything please help me out by writing in to break it down for me.  It’d be nice if city dwellers gay and straight who want to go for a walk in the park could use an urban nature trail for its intended purpose to enjoy the woods without having to worry about a bunch of creepy men using the woods as a place to hide, spy and skulk like horny sasquatches.

I also had a mostly terrific run along the Charles River’s scenic path, except for the jackass  intentionally running on the wrong side of the lane and playing chicken with me and presumably other runners. Is that some kind of Harvard Delphic initiation rite? I was jogging along minding my own business and this short, shirtless twerp with a Napoleon complex comes barrelling towards me from a good distance away. 

This twentysomething guy is small, like half my size, and all pumped up like a swollen tick from too many hours in the gym making up for his thimble-sized ego and probably traumatized by years of being known as the small guy in junior high school. Mind you I’m as far right on the paved track as I can humanly get.  He’s making a beeline right at me instead of simply moving to his own right like a grownup would do.  Was he serious? Picture a terrier charging at a gorilla. The physics alone were going to cream the guy and leave me unscathed if we impacted. 

I guess he wanted to go back and brag to the rest of the track team how he’s such a badass that the mere sight of his chiseled pecs made a middle-aged man twice his size move out of his way. It was like two rams charging each other in the wild, only I’m one of them, and only I find it comical instead of remotely important. I’m thinking this idiot’s going to break his nose on my sternum and then bounce back and smack the pavement like a pancake from the momentum, and I’ll hop over him and keep running.  

So he’s getting closer and closer. I’m thinking maybe I’ll pepper spray him if he gets within 3 feet of me (I carry it for dogs), because he’s charging me out of the blue and clearly planning to assault me. I also thought of just sticking out my fist as he approached and letting his tanned yuppie face ram into that. 

At the last, I mean at the very last split second, I mean our knees almost touched and I’m ready to clothesline him, macho man chickens out and hops to the right, off the paved trail and onto the dirt path alongside it. We both keep running and I glare at him as we pass. He won’t make eye contact but stares at the ground, sullen and humiliated. 

Why he did this to himself I’ll never know. I never got the point of this excercise in stupidity. It was just Beantown bizarre. I said, “Nice move!” to the little guy as he passed and finished my run. 

The best revenge is living well, so I ate and drank extremely well at Cafeteria on Newbury Street (the place so nice I ate there thrice).  It’s overpriced with an upscale vibe but laid back and friendly. Until this week I’d forgotten the joys of a mid-day cocktail at an outdoor cafe. I recommend their Well Dressed Martini made with Chopin vodka and bleu cheese stuffed olives coupled with either the lamb sausage pizza or their fresh, not-too-heavily-breaded calamari, along with an iced tea to wash it all down.

[photos and images via me, queersighted.com, wikipedia, BU and youtube]

Down by the river
Down by the banks of the River Charles
That’s where you’ll find me
Along with lovers, buggers and thieves

This private school entrance is also spatially not in service. I checked.  But when they get it fixed I’m outta here.

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[image via harlemworldblog.wordpress.com]