THE OXFORD (FUCKING OHIO) DICTIONARY OF QUOTATIONS: Blog Awards, Deodorant for the Parts that Matter, Old Bigots and Drag Shows

"Well, I’m presenting it to another bad motherfucker who knows when it’s time to hit delete and when he has something worth posting, so without further adieu I present The Golden Delete Key Award to The Zenformation Professional."

- THE WOEFUL LIBRARIAN,
@ Your Library, Aug. 1

This really cracked me up when I read it - I wasn't sure if I should write a speech in the comments box, or if I should pull a Marlon Brando and have some former beauty pageant contestant dressed in Native American garb decline the award on my behalf as some sort of protest...

Seriously. No fucking clue what to do with blog awards.

So I'm passing this award on, to the wonderful Pia Savage at Courting Destiny, for choosing to wade out of the political gossip muck that most popular bloggers focus on these days and into a much more dynamic world of blogging focused to fiction, exploratory essays, and writings about living life to the fullest with a nonverbal learning disorder, surviving in a post-9/11 New York, and moving to South Carolina.

That takes a set and a half, trust me. There's more to life than just politics. But when one gets tired of writing about the liars, crooks, and thieves that govern us, well, the online armchair quarterbacks tend to be unforgiving.

And with Courting celebrating its fourth birthday this month, Pia deserves more than a blog award. With some of the nastiness she experienced from her political writing days, she's a living testament to the fact that, yeah, we need a blogger's equivalent of the Purple Heart...

* * * *

"And hey. Let's be careful out there."

- SGT. PHIL ESTERHAUS (Michael Conrad),
from Hill Street Blues, television series.

Recently, I've been spending quite a bit of time wallowing in my own 1980s childhood nostalgia, thanks to the first two seasons of this landmark television series now being available on DVD. No clue why the remaining seasons (the series ran on NBC domestically 1981-1987) have yet to be released. But, well, if you're too young to remember it, well, give it a shot.

I used to watch this show with my mother, curled up on the couch. Now that I'm older, wiser, and able to get some of the adult humor...

* * * *

"Touch that laptop, and I'll cut you, mister."

- A wayward, grad school shopping traveler,
Whilst crashing in the ol' Fortress of Solitude

Why is it that there are people who feel the need to tell me what I CAN'T put online? Especially when all they would have to do is explain to the men in their lives (I spent two nights sleeping between two women on a tiny full sized mattress) that, yes, we all slept in the same bed together because I don't have a guest bed or couch?

Jeez.

The alums from one of my alma maters are just as strange as the Local U. alums when it comes to worrying that I'll somehow use one too many euphemisms and start an argument over something that didn't happen.

And no, nothing happened. Though an apartment without air conditioning...

* * * *

"Look, chicks don't understand. Swamp ass and chafing are the two greatest threats to Mankind's manhood. Maybe not Womankind's womanhood, but..."

- DR. TAINTSTICK, whose idea to keep a second tube
of antiperspirant handy for the ol' scrotum
deserves a Nobel Prize

Seriously. Five guys sat around on the steps of an almost deserted bar a few weeks ago, holding an impromptu Swamp Ass Caucus. And yes, there are things about men women just will never understand.

For the record, Old Spice... tingles. But, working out or out on the trail, wow.

* * * *

"He's just a boy. I dunno. I think I'm ready at this point in my life for a real man."

- A 12 or 13-year-old girl, overheard at
The Oxford Summer Music Festival

Took me three hours to quit laughing. Kids are the darnedest things. Two young girls were bickering back and forth between themselves in an alley behind the bar I frequent.

* * * *

"You know, I'm sick and tired of a few queers ruining [the Local U.]'s reputation with stupid drag shows. No way in hell is it that popular!"

"It's one of Oxford's biggest tourist attractions, for a good cause, and, well--"

"I don't give money to THIS university to help faggots get outta closets!"

"Well, I don't give a shit about cold-hearted bigots, but I'm still letting you have your say..."

- Heated conversation with a middle-aged,
obviously drunk Local U. Alumnus last week.

This was the closest I've come to dragging a guy out of a nice restaurant and beating him within an inch of his white-slacks-and-deck-shoes life in several years. Normally, I can deal diplomatically with hatemongers of all sorts - Klansmen, Aryan Brotherhood and Christian Identity members, anti-Semites and Radical New World Zionists, Brown and Black Power types, etc...

The only thing that stopped me? His saint of a best friend from his college years, who reminded me that, yes, even off the clock I - along with the thousands of other employees of my greater institution - still represent the ideal of a diverse educational landscape that values all opinions, even unpopular ones. Fisticuffs two blocks from the Local U. campus would accomplish nothing, aside from possible arrest and a trip to the unemployment line for yours truly.

The Spectrum Drag Show, in recent years, has become one of this community's biggest tourist attractions. The AIDS charity events draw hundreds of people and thousands of dollars into Oxford, which helps the Local U., businesses, and the city itself in terms of public image and revenue. I'm proud, too, to call some of those drag queens friends - they really do make for some gorgeous ladies.

And hey, how many Oxford Fucking Ohio hetero bloggers pose for a quick pic with one of the drag show's founders, Barry from QueerCincinnati? Yeah, the guy's an out-and-proud Local U. alum - and has as much right to be who he wants to be in this town as your average straight alum from the 1960s, 1970s, or even 2008.

What good would it do to be involved in just another drunken brawl on the sidewalk, over someone twenty years my senior being unable to cope with change?

With true diversity comes tolerance. And with tolerance comes that understanding that everybody has a right to their own opinions - even opinions one doesn't agree with.

* * * *

"You can pretty much milk anything with nipples."

- TONE TANK,
"Only in America" [MP3],
The Black Six Sessions
[Free EP, ScumLife 2008]

This one lyric has been stuck in my head ever since I first downloaded this song a few months ago.

Tone Tank, one half of the Brooklyn indie duo Iller Than Theirs, has released probably one of the best rap tracks of 2008. And, well, the whole EP is completely free. Check it out.

Seriously.

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