Greetings from Justinland

Sinners Welcome

  Sinners Welcome 
  Originally uploaded by justinjtravis.

Check out some new photos I took yesterday in the rain.

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Two Bits

The Kansas Quarter features an American Bison and some Sunflowers.  I like it and am reluctant to spend it when I find one in my pocket.  My only regret is that they should have added a rainbow in the background.

What is on your state's quarter?  What SHOULD have been on your state's quarter?

I saw this on another blog and was amused and yet discouraged. Was Ben Franklin the wisest American who ever lived?  And then there is George. Discuss?

George Bush: I'm not going to change my mind.

Ben Franklin: For having lived long, I have experienced many instances of being obliged, by better information or fuller consideration, to change opinions, even on important subjects, which I once thought right but found to be otherwise. ... When you're finished changing, you're finished.

Noted Without Comment

A short list of things I would write about if I wasn't so dang busy...

1)Tuna Burgers
2) Ken, Kurt and Blaine
3) JT LeRoy
4) Lethal  Beauty
5) Santino
6) The Book of Daniel
7) Girl Scout Cookies: Thin Mints
8) My new Honda

What's on your mind?

Easy Like Sunday Morning

Whoa!  Finally time to take a deep breath and slow down for a moment.

Senorita Maria  has been wheezing all week and Doc Hawk was determined to keep her out of that nasty, germy hospital.  The hospital is about the last place anyone needs to be when they are sick, ypu know.  Recent studies show that the decible level inside your average hospital is about the same as running a lawn mower. And then there are all those antibiotic resistant germs. So, that has keep me busy, giving breathing treatment, pushing fluids and watching the DVD of Ice Princess over and over.

...and speaking of ice princesses, everybody at our house loves that Johnny Weir. How about you?

Pretty Miss B turned 18 this week.  I have an 18 year old daughter.  One of us had better start lying about their age.

QVC had something called HoneyBells as their today`s special value.  Apparently it is some sort of citrus fruit that is a grapefruit/tangerine hybrid.  Of course, I wasn`t going to pay $11 S&H for a freakin tangerine, and yet I was obsessed.  this happened once before with the elusive cherimoyo, you may recall.  Anyway, none of the local stores have the darn thing and I feel my honeybell ship may have sailed.

This weeks date night movie was Memoirs of a Geisha.  Very pretty movie, especially if you are into textiles. Not near enough hot naked cowboy sex for me, but I loved the kimonos. When we were in Vancouver a few years ago, we saw an exhibit of a famous geisha`s (gurlfriend`s name was Ichimaru (1906–1997 stuff; all of her silks and obis and hair dangles. Lovely, delicate stuff. If you like 12 year old Brooke Shields in Pretty Baby, you will like this movie.  If you like your movies with Clint Eastwood and car chases, skip it.

My favorite yarn store has 25% of today on EVERYTHING?  Should I go or do I have enough yarn all ready? 

Date Night for Cowboys

and Indians

It’s January and that means it is influenza season and New Year/New You season. Kindly ol’ Doc Hawk and I have darn busy with wheezing babies and folks that want to change their bad habits overnight.

“Kiss me Goodbye and I’ll see you in the Spring”

Yeah, we are a busy GUPPIE couple, so we have to schedule ‘date night’ to spend time together.  Nothing fancy just a nice dinner at a restaurant that has china instead of paper plates, an early movie and home to bed before 10pm.

It is such a different life than our male protagonists in Ang Lee’s Brokeback Mountain, our date night movie of the week.  Now let me just say up front, there is not enough hot nekkid cowboy sex in the great outdoors in this movie.  Ang Lee should have consulted with Kristen Bjorn.  There is sheep and glorious scenery and I like both, but if you are expecting softcore cowboy porn, you may want to look someplace else.  I can make some suggestions.

But pretty mountains and sheep aren’t the best reason to see the movie.  It’s a love story, but Oscar Wilde wasn’t being amusing (for once) when he wrote about the ‘love that dare not speak its name’.  Our cowboys don’t talk much, certainly not about 'this thang' they have.   Jack and Ennis fall in love on the mountain one summer in 1963, just 6 years before the first angry drag queen threw a rock at the police at the Stonewall bar.   Not that either of them would understand or appreciate the Stonewall riots.  New York City is a long way from Wyoming.

You know Wyoming, the place where two cranked up cowboys beat Matthew Shepard to death not that long ago.

Of course men have been giving each other the eye since men started walking around erect....maybe even before.  But our boys are unable to place themselves in a historical context and they certainly have never heard the concept that gay men are born that way.  They are cowboys, for God’s sake and Cowboys ain’t queer!  So ultimately, we get a movie about two miserable men wasting their lives, going through the motions, unable to scratch their itch and have the one thing they really want. 

This ain’t a happy movie. It’s  freakin tragedy.

But WOW! Heath Ledger as Ennis gives a performance worthy of the best of Brando. The boy is so emotionally repressed, its a wonder he doesn’t explode more often. The words he doesn’t say carry way more weight than the few words he chooses to speak.  I see this guy in my office all the time. Bravo Heath!  Jake Gyllenhaal is a cutie (those eyes) and his Jack is just a little sleazy and yet he is vulnerable.  The ladies in the film are also most wonderful as their characters grow hard and cold over the years.

But Yo? Ang Lee? What is up with all the naked boobage, dude? I mean, there are just some things in the moveis I don't want to see.  But you are forgiven because I loved Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon

So, grab your boyfriend and declare it ‘date night’ because we’re queer and we’re here and we aren’t mentally ill or hell bound sodomites.  We’re just a couple of Guppie boys, still in love after all these years, going to the movies.

10 Things I Learned in 2005

1) Mother Nature is a cruel and relentless bitch.

2) And you can’t depend on the government to save your drowning ass

3) When someone ‘guarantees’ delivery by a certain time/date, find out exactly what that means…IN WRITING.

4)  35 is about time to start caring about your skin

5) You really should pay attention to your tire pressure.

6) You might want to do the right thing, but expect some roadblocks.  For example, it is difficult to adopt a cat, join the Red Cross or give away a car.

7) You can survive nicely without a big screen hi-def  teevee, a new computer or a $60,000 Japanese sports car.  You don’t really even need a dishwasher.

8) When planning a wedding, don’t sweat the details, everything will be fine provided the bride is beautiful and you don’t run out of alcohol.

9) Just because you have a PhD, doesn’t mean you can help your child with her math homework.

10) Sometimes Love Ain’t Enough

Here's to the lessons we will learn in 2006! 
Happy New Year