The Sweet Escape

This week has been fantastic. Honestly, I am super sad that it is over.

Let's see, I left ya'll off on Sunday?
Monday I don't remember anything, to be honest. I don't think I went out. I think I crashed at my friend's dorm room which is, oh yeah, back on my campus. Crazy much? Yes.

Tuesday, Carl and I drove around for much of the day and then decided to head down to Baltimore. We met up with Brendan -- who we discovered that night is my twin (not in the literal sense, but in the personality sense). For those keeping track that means we now have Tall Brendan and Twin Brendan. Anyways, Brendan was at his friend Frankie's house, and Derrick arrived shortly after us. We partied it up there and, I won't lie, somehow ended up just chilling around the house naaked. Eh, it happens. A lot with Frankie, actually. :-P
Anyways, I was laying across Frankie with my head in Derrick's lap (Derrick kept his pants on) and the boy got like jealous or something and left, and we kind of had this heated debate about it after that and I'll just say...I'm less endeared now. He's still cute, I'm just not sure he can handle me. I don't, I can't handle jealous fits.

I spent the night at Frankie's and then the next night....Twin Brendan, Frankie, and I went to a strip club in Baltimore called Spectrum. It wasn't atrocious...but it was pretty tragic. I counted twelve people other than the three of us there. Including their dancers.
They closed at midnight, and we returned to Casa di Frankie and we all crashed there that night as well.
I think if it hadn't been a Wednesday, it would have been much better. Or, at least, I hope so.

Thursday the three of us trekked down to Apex in D.C., which was alright, but not as good as some times I've been there. Okay, rephrase: the last Thursday I was there was better but it was a fairly average night for Apex.
I did run into my friend Alphonso just as we were leaving though, that was fun! Honestly, I can't remember where I crashed that night, but I am pretty sure it wasn't Frankie's.

In case you hadn't gathered this, during the day I would do a huuuuuge nothing. The next night (Friday) Club XS was having a special appearance by Billy Brandt. The Bossman had told me I could come in briefly to meet him, and I was going to Baltimore so I planned to make this a super brief introduction. As it was, I was in the club for a total of five minutes.
I walked in, discussed some stuff with the Bossman and then introduced myself to Billy Brandt. I was a little afraid I offended him as I walked out shortly after -- it really wasn't that I was star struck (well, mildly), and it had nothing at all to do with him looking very little like his pictures (still really hot though!), but more to do with that Carl was going through the McDonald's drive-through in my car, without me being there.
Anyways, I went to leave without an autograph and I was actually stopped! Billy Brandt wanted to give me an autograph!! He was a sweetheart, and he even got very slightly flustered about my name. It was kinda cute. He first spelled it "Gram" and then wrote the "ham" over the m. He was all apologetic too.
So, now, the corrected autograph reads:

Graham
Great to meet you.
Love Billy Brandt

I gotta find out if he has a blog or a Myspace or something. He's a really great guy. People seem surprised by that, but of course since I've talked to three porn stars on the blogosphere (you guys know who you are, and I adore all of you!) I was really not surprised by the fact that he's more than just a sex symbol.

So Carl and I headed down into Maryland, met up with Frankie and Twin Brendan, and then headed to Sonar. This was Frankie's first time there. It was a BLAST and so many people were there -- Derrick and Nikki who we had met last Friday, plus their friend Ethan who was cool. Twin Brendan came with us, obviously, and some of his friends were there. Tall Brendan was there with his friend Cory, who is also cool. Carl was there too. I feel like more people were there, but I must've forgotten in the excitement.
This group came on stage to do a live performance while a bunch of us were up there. Carl, Twin Brendan, and I decided to stay on stage because the performers said we could if we danced. So there we are, back up dancers to this group of phenomenal women rappers. Yeah, it was pretty fabulous.
And have I mentioned that Twin Brendan and I are like the perfect pair? You want a party, you want to have both of us there. No, for serious.

After Sonar, we went to their friend Crystal's house where we hung out in her hot tub. Yes, naked. What fun are hot tubs when you wear anything in them, right? Of course right.
So, you're really only supposed to stay in a hot tub for an hour, tops. We were definitely in it for an hour and fifteen minutes. Oh well, shit happens and we're still pretty so it must be okay. :-P

Saturday, yesterday, was the biggest day. Carl and I returned to Pennsylvania and then split up. Carl stayed in that night (party pooper :-P) but not I. I headed up to Shimmer in Harrisburg. I'm not gonna lie, it was mostly to get my flirt on with the hot soda jerk who works there and who I was pretty sure was behind the counter that night. And, yeah, I was right, Josh was there and I chatted with him for most of the time I was there.
I meant to leave at 10:30 but my car wouldn't start, so I got a ride down to Club XS and worked. Twin Brendan joined the rest of us go go dancers. It was a little bit of a dull night, not a bad night just not exactly exciting. I had a lot of fun though. And it was cool because Billy Brandt came and was just partying like everyone else. So cool. Cooler still? He remembered me from my five minute adventure the night before. As he explained it to me: "I never forget a space. I forget names, but never faces." And then he proved it by describing our meeting the night before. I was very impressed.

When Twin Brendan and I got paid, you would think that would be the end of the night, but no. We were ending my spring break with a blast, so the trio of Twin Brendan, Frankie, and I made our way to an afterhours club called 1722 in Baltimore.
To my surprise I ran into my gorgeous friend Jeci there. It was pretty shocking, but quite cool. After Seventeen, we went to eat breakfast at this neat, eccentric and eclectic diner called Paper Moon. And then Brendan went homee and I crashed at Frankie's again.

Today, Frankie brought me back to my car and I spent the rest of the day trying to get it to start, until I gave up and called AAA. They towed it to a shop for me, and I will deal with it tomorrow.
But I am back on campus, and back to the regularity of my usual life. Except, once again, minus a car. We think it's the starter that died.

The one disappointment of this week, and it was definitely made up for by the fun I had, was that I didn't get to go to NYC. Or Memphis, but that idea was shortlived anyways.

(More pictures coming!!)

I have had an exquisite* past couple of days!

Do you remember back in the day when I started my weekend partying on Thursday nights? I am back at it!
Thursday night Carl, Cody, Jenny, David, and I made our way to Club XS for college night. It was not a particularly amazing night, but it was good. With a lot of drama on the side, which ew, but that's what happens when you mix boxed wine with three people in the back seat (I stayed sober, I was riding shotgun!)
(I'm hugging my friend Eric in that picture that Cody took.)

Then Friday happened. Friday was wonderful. You know why? Because I GOT MY CAR BACK!!!! FINALLY! Six weeks after my accident, I can finally drive again! And, oh boy, I did! I drove from Harrisburg back to cmapus and then out to the Park City Mall, and then back to campus and then to York where I met up with Cody, at which point he took over driving and took my car to Townson, Maryland. We met up with our friend Brendan and headed further south to Washington D.C.
Our friend Jason was working as a shotboy at Cobalt, but since I couldn't get in and most of our companions for the night had bailed on us, no one went to Cobalt to support him. We spent the whole night at Club Apex, where there were a few gorgeous people (and I made out with a girl, eh, it happens). Mostly they were ugly, but it's alright, it was still fun.

This afternoon I awoke in my bed (lord only knows how I made it upstairs and into my room. I only remember getting to the door of my dorm.) to discover my friend Melanie STANDING IN THE DOOR WAY! I had forgotten completely that she and I were planning to watch Saved! and so...we did. And all the special features on my DVD.

So tonight I am going to work. Buuuut....I am driving myself there. And I am driving myself back. Because I have my car back!!! :)

*exquisite is a word I 100% stole from Cody.

"And the last thing he saw on this Earth was the sparkling lights of Laramie, Wyoming."

This is more like it.
You may recall last weekend was kind of dull for me, not in a bad way but it was unusual.

But before I begin, a question for discussion: do all of you talk about blogging and/or your blogosphere pals in the Real World? If so, when does the topic come up? What do you say about it? How do you refer to other bloggers? "My friend"? "This guy who's life I read about online"?
I'll give you my answers after I see a few of yours. :)

No such thing happened this time! Oh no! Last night was spectacular!
To begin with, I went to see The Laramie Project at York Senior High School -- a production which the Westboro Baptist Church was protesting. Now, I figured that the Phelps clan would be entertaining but oh, I had no idea.
First of all, two of the looneys were in the road and we almost hit them. Then we saw the signs. Some of them were exactly what we expected, gays are evil blah-blah, BUT there were some unexpected signs.
First and most hysterical among these was the sign that said "You will eat your children". At this point, I lost it completely. Hysterical. It's not even directed at anyone -- it's directed at EVERYONE. Not "Gays eat their children" or "Americans eat their children". No, you. As in, you all.
The next sign that left an impression on me was another one aimed at "you all" and not any particular group of "sinners". Oh no, it was a message to everybody. "God is your enemy" it said. So, call me crazy, but if God is the enemy...why would anybody worship Him?
Earth to Phelps, maybe you should read the signs you give your disciples to hold up and make sure they actually say what you want them to.

Anyways, we got inside to see the play and I ran into some more friends there (Jason, David, and Danny). The play was AMAZING. First of all, mostly I'm sure thanks to Fred Phelps publicity efforts (so he can do something right...), the high school's auditorium had not only sold out the thousand seats but there was at least 50 people doing the whole standing-room-only thing.
Second of all, it was absolutely the best acted high school production I have ever seen. Okay, the tech needed a little bit of work (mostly the spotlight) but it was GREAT. Astounding. If I hadn't been concerned about getting a ride to work later, I would have stayed and pitched my school's theater department to them.
The play, for those of you unfamiliar with it, is about the town of Laramie following the brutal beating of Matthew Shepard. It is basically a series of interviews, over 200 of them, combined into one theatrical masterpiece created by the Tectonic Theater Company. The play shows how the attack on Matthew Shepard disrupted an entire town, and how many people's opinions and lives were changed because of it. It shows the denial the town went through, the attempts to seperate themselves from the crime, acceptance of ownership of the crime.
It talks about Fred Phelps, which is one reason his cult goes so far out of their way to protest at its productions. He is a character in it, and he gets OWNED. By angels no less.

If you can't find a production near you I highly recommend checking out the movie or the book. The story, the entire piece, is intensely moving and something no one should miss out on.

So I hitched a ride with Jason to get to work. He stopped by his house, and then we hit up a hotel for a pre-party because some of his friends from D.C. had come up for the weekend. David came as well, in his own car, although Danny disappeared at some point between the play and this. There I discovered the friends of D.C. were actually people that I knew! Alphonso and Ryan, as it turned out, who I had met down at Apex. So, we were there for like 10 minutes and then we headed off to the club.
The club was PACKED. It was great. I made a lot of money and the crowd was actually well-behaved (except for my oh-so-shitfaced friends, but I love them anyways! :P) There was this one woman who gave me this blinking light she was wearing, just because I complimented her on it at the beginning of the night and, when she was waaaaaay drunk, she remembered that I'd said something and she gave it to me. I clipped it on my undies!

Another guy, who was a big fan, approached my holding a snap c-ring. Which he then offered me. My first thought was "Dear lord, I hope this was just randomly in his pocket!" Then he told me he wanted to see if it fit me. I told him I could go try it on. "I want to try it on you," he replied -- at which point I told him it would have to wait til after work and when work ended I left as quickly as possible so as to avoid having that...uh...tested.

We adjourned back to the hotel room where we pretty much lazed about until I decided I wanted a shower. Now, of course, I didn't think to lock the door to the bathroom. So, it really shouldn't have been a surprise when David came in a talked to me while I was getting undressed. Whoops.
Then Jason came in to tell me he was leaving. He was in there telling me he was leaving for about five minutes while I showered, which was kind of odd. More to the point, he didn't seem to remember that he'd seen everything before when we'd been in Brendan's hot tub so obviously I wasn't going to by shy about him (where as with David I'd been like pulling down my shirt to cover up). Then Alphonso came in because he wanted a shower so I scooched out and dried while he jumped in. It was interesting. Note to self: ALWAYS lock the bathroom. :P

You know, something terrific though?
Today is the one year anniversary of what is to date on the most devestating things any guy has put me through. Our break up was horrendous, scary, and all kinds of bad. But the good news? I didn't even realize that it was that day until I realized it was my friend's 22nd birthday today, and then I recalled her last birthday, at which I got totally drunk for the first time ever, which was entirely because I was flipping out over my ex-boyfriend.
So, happy birthday Lily!
And, one more time, good riddance apeface! :)

"I only want to have a good time"

I really try not to make posts that have no pictures.
I also try not to swear copiously in any of my entries here.
Today, I have accepted the fact that I *must* break both of those rules in telling about my weekend.

As per usual, my weekend started Thursday. I had a date, with James. You may remember James from our very casual date before I went home for the holidays. So this was, in my estimation, a second date. I asked him out, and I paid for dinner...which had been a very nice dinner.
And that's when it started to become clear that he saw this as two friends hanging out.

He ended up coming to Club Apex in Washington D.C. with Brendan, Cody, Carl and I. I had invited him and was more than happy he was coming.
He spent almost none of the night with me. When we danced, he looked anywhere but at me and didn't touch me...he would usually brush my hand off of him in a very subtle manner if I put my hands on him.
I didn't get a good night kiss.
The worst part? I'm feeling like I was led on, but I'm not upset about it. I was so expecting to be screwed over again that I'm just like "Eh, time to move on."

Friday I was exhausted and didn't do anything. It was nice...a change of pace. But I was so tired I couldn't go to sleep until 5 in the morning.
I got a phone call at 7 in the morning. My friend Katie, a very close friend of mine who was abroad all last semester, needed help. Her boyfriend was incredibly sick and needed to be returned to campus -- which was fine, she would drive her car. The trick was getting her back to her off-campus housing.
Like the idiot or possibly the saint that I am, I got up, threw on clothes, ansd helped her out. Then she took me out to breakfast, and brought me to do the errands I had needed to do that day. I got back to my dorm at 10:40 -- 20 minutes before my alarm was set to go off. So I turned off the alarm and went to sleep. I woke up at 4 and got ready to go to work.

First of all, I woke up incredibly horny. I don't know why, since I'm very rarely horny and even more rarely THAT horny. So I was hoping to go to work at the club, and go home with somebody there.
Then my friend Karissa asked if she could come. I said okay. Then Cody needed a ride. I said okay. "I'll just get laid on Sunday," I figured, "But I can get someone's number tonight."

Tonight at work was one of those nights that makes me wonder why the hell I do that job. The utter BULLSHIT I have to put up with sometimes astounds me.
So, to start with, these two guys -- a couple -- showed up and announced they'd been hired to dance. No one who actually works there had ever seen them before, but you couldn't convince them that they weren't dancers there.
They weren't dancers. They were bitches. They began insutling another dancer there, calling him ugly (although, really, the bitchier of the two was not attractive at all, so seriously...) and insulting his friends. For no reason. Neither Chris (the other dancer) or any of the other dancers had said a word to them. They monopolized our space to dance in, too.

So, around 1:45, after making a mere $14 in tips (I was pissed about that too), I called it quits. I went to put on my clothes -- forgetting that (because I was wearing far skimpier underwear than usual) I'd worn my jeans into the DJ booth.
As I returned from the office to get my jeans, I was accosted by this 70 year old. The same one who had gotten into the passenger seat of my car? Yeah, him. Bald, nasty, full of himself, and drunk as shit. It took FOUR people as well as myself to get me away from him, and by that point? He'd not only copped a feel, he'd gotten in some hardcore fondeling. I felt so incredibly dirty and disgusting. But that's the job -- you have to put up with that shit. People are there to help, and they tried, but shit is gonna happen.

When I was back in office, clad in my jeans thankfully, I heard over the intercom a call "Security to the stage, security to the stage." One of the two bitches who thought they were dancers had punched a guy for pulling down his underwear.
Anyways, when I'm hearing him tell the story to the manager a bit later, I couldn't help myself. In a perfectly matter-of-fact, polite way I just said "Putting up with disrespect is part of the job."
He flipped the fuck out. "You're a fucking crackwhore!" he shouts, "Go smoke more crack." I was livid, but I behaved and said nothing else. My slenderness is mostly due to my Crohn's disease...do you make fun of chemo patients for being bald? NO! Get some fucking people skills, and get the fuck out of my club. Whores. I was SO PISSED.

In the meantime, Karissa finds me and tells me she's going home with somebody. She points out the guy. My eyes widened. I nodded, but I know I'm getting a call soon..."GRAHAM!! HOW COULD YOU LET ME GO HOME WITH THAT UGLY MOTHER FUCKER?!?! WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?!" It'll be my fault, but I'll still come pick her up.
Meanwhile, Cody had been dancing with this guy he's had a crush on for MONTHS. And then they started making out. I encouraged this...and Cody went home with his crush. We'll see what happens.
But basically, everybody got laid but me.

Although, I did get hit on by a friend of mine who is DEVESTATINGLY hot. I'll keep you posted on that.

"You've got so much to do and only so many hours in a day..."

So my weekend, which was crazy as per usual, began early. It began on Thursday night, and what an adventure it was!

You see, Brendan, Cody, Jason, and Josh were planning on visiting Club Apex in Washington D.C. I had not planned on going with, because of Friday's road trip back to Rhode Island.
But I ended up having a very frustrating day on Thursday and I decided that, since every plan I'd set out for that day had been screwed up and twisted in a way that was not fun...I was going to screw up one of my plans in a fun way. And I was going to be spontaneous.

So, 7:30 Thursday night, not a thing packed for the return to RI, I jumped into Cody's red convertible (not as hot as it sounds, trust me. :P) and we left for York. We picked up Josh, and flew down the roads to Maryland to meet up with Brendan. We piled into Brendan's sleek and silver BMW series five (which is plenty hotter than it sounds) and headed down to D.C. where we going to meet up with Jason -- and Chris, who dances with me on weekends!
We went to Soho, which was right near the club, and got food and coffee. I myself got a White Chocolate Raspberry Cheesecake which is pretty much heavenly/orgasmic. Not even kidding, try it some time.
So, then we went to Club Apex. I made some new friends -- three. Two of whom I look forward to seeing next time we go down to Apex. Cody also took a video on his camera...if you look closely, you can see me occassionally when the light is right. I was dancing right in front of him, a little to the right, though sometimes I'm definitely dead center in front of the camera. Thankfully, Cody is taller than me so you can still see stuff. :P
(The picture is of Josh and I.)

Now, I really can't tell you what the point of taking videos inside a club is because you can't see anything...but hey, since it's there, I figured I might as well post it! :P

We got back from D.C. at six in the morning. I set my alarm for 10:30, packed in an hour (I'm discovering now I didn't bring enough clothes that I like to wear out...oh well. I'll do a lot of laundry. :P), slept til 11:30, threw my stuff in the car, got Meghan, said my good-byes....
And then by 12:30 we were off. I drove for a while, we switched when we got to New Jersey. She drove til Connecticutt, and then I drove the rest of the way. We got to my house at around 7:30 that night. Pretty good, since it's an 8 hour train ride and we'd had to brave rush hour near New Haven.

So, I powernapped -- exhausted, and then I was off. I'd gotten a spontaneous invite (well, okay, he sent out a myspace bulletin asking if anyone wanted to go with him) to a party his friends were having. So, I went and met Scott in Providence.
...and I drank more than I should have.
And I think I annoyed Scott. Which, well, I guess he doesn't like me drunk. Oh well, it's not like it happens with any frequency.
But...I made some new friends!

I left there at about 5, got home at 5:30, and slept. Then I woke up and proceeded to get ready for a Christmas party my friends Big Bill, Little Bill, and Chris were hosting. Even though I ended up two hours late (thanks to my mom :P), it was a great time. And, following the theme for the weekend, I made new friends! Most importantly though, I caught up with old ones. And then I stayed to help clean up, and then I went and found out that no matter whether or not where I parked was legal...I didn't get a ticket. :P

Today was interesting because an old friend of my parents came by. You see, my brother and my existence hinged entirely on this person's behavior when he was sixteen. My parents spent a year raising him in his mother's stead.
Apparently, he's also gay and has been with his partner for 14 years. How impressive and inspiring is that? It does happen! :D