"Are you coming along, too?"
"Um. Well..." I'm secretly horrified by the idea. "Absolutely. Of course."
"You're not wearing that, are you?"
"No. I have pants somewhere that I can wear."
"You look like you're ready for a basketball game."
"That's hilarious on a few different levels."
Clay, who I've only just met, has been ripping on me for the duration. He looks like Ron Perlman's character from Sons of Anarchy and he even rides a bike. He isn't actually wearing his leather biker get-up, but he might as well be. I can still see it on him. I'm somewhat intimidated by him and curious about his constant attention to me. But I am the new guy, afterall. I'm fresh meat. Maybe that's all it is. Maybe not. I probably don't want to know. I finish my beer instead and Clay just smirks at me. He's one of the four other guys crammed with me inside Woody's office. His roommate Ronnie came with him.
Ronnie looks like a stocky Jake Gyllenhaal with a full beard. He has truly amazing eyes and would be the hottest man I've ever met if he wasn't such a hot mess. If he ever gets his shit together - well, even if he doesn't... Who am I kidding? The man is gorgeous. But, like I said, he's a hot damn mess. Also, Ronnie has been waiting to hear back from this guy he was supposed to meet tonight for drinks. Clay drug him along to get him drunk and hopefully make him less of a moody little bitch. I met both of them through Woody.
Woody (who looks like Woody Harrelson but thinner and with a goatee) is a character and he knows absolutely everyone - and absolutely everyone knows him. By association with him, I'm getting to know absolutely everyone as well. If I'm ever anywhere in Akron, I can drop his name and everything will be all good. Anyway, we met a week ago. He's a cool guy, but not for me, so we just hang out once a week. It wasn't necessarily the cats, either. Woody has 6 felines that have completely taken over his home. He's the crazy cat lady of the Akron gay community. It wasn't necessarily NOT the cats, though. They may have had something to do with it.
It's funny because I met him the week after the horrible fair date I went on (which I'm still intending on posting about at some point). The same day I met him, I started talking to another guy. This other guy was at the same fair I went to on my date, and again later with my sister, and he was looking for someone to hang out with him. I wasn't about to have myself another terrible fair date experience and I told him about it. Well, he insisted it would go much, much differently if I accepted his invitation. But, I was already meeting Woody and I still wasn't feeling the fair so he asked me to another fair happening on the following weekend. Since Woody turned out to be more buddy material than anything, I eventually agreed. And, since Woody knows absolutely everyone and the guy was from that area, I asked him about the other guy.
"Of course I know who that is. That's my ex-husband."
"No, it isn't."
"It sure is. He ask you to the fair?"
"Shut the fuck up. He did. He actually asked me to two different fairs."
"Of course he did. He loves fairs. I shouldn't be surprised. I know what he likes or what he looks for. He would eat you with a spoon."
This story, naturally, has become an instant legend in my new circle. Clay and Ronnie laughed for about twenty minutes straight over it. I laughed for about ten when I originally found out and I still chuckle over it now. I didn't go, obviously. That's a little weird. Also, he's more of a mess than Ronnie. I'm not about all that drama.
We're all crammed together in his office doing some drinking and chainsmoking. I'm relieved any time the conversation isn't centered directly on me. But, I'm the new guy and everyone wants to know all about me - Clay especially.
"So, when you're not chatting up my boy's ex-husband... What do you do?"
"I work in a factory."
"Blue collar guy. You're just all kinds of rough trade, aren't you?"
"Look who's talking, SAMCRO."
"Bit of a pistol, too. I like that."
"You have no idea."
"Guess I'll have to find out. Are you coming along, too?"
So, we're back to that question. Woody wanted to go out, so he invited some friends to go with him. I decided I wasn't really into it (especially since I've never gone to a gay bar in my entire life - something I told absolutely NO ONE in that group) so I was going home whenever they all showed up. But, then Clay and Ronnie showed up. Ronnie was the reason I hadn't left already. Sure, he had something going on already but that obviously wasn't working out. I wasn't interested in starting anything with him, but I did want to hang out with him and gaze dreamily into those eyes a while longer.
Also, I was tired of Clay's shit. Damn right, I'm going.
(...to be continued)
I was meeting Behry at Lock 3. He had invited me to this album release party at Musica Friday night for this band. He was friends with the singer and had an extra ticket that was meant for a bud who backed out at the last minute. I didn't mind being the stand-in. I haven't been to a concert in forever and free is free. This invite came at the conclusion of a day long chat exchange we had on Thursday. Yeah, things were moving along quickly. Anyway, we met at Lock 3 and had dinner and pre-show drinks at the bar across the street from it: Lockview.
I tried 3 different brands of Ocktoberfest beer and ordered the muenster grilled cheese with pesto and cucumber. The place was cool. I liked the atmosphere. It used to be a music spot before the owner decided he'd get robbed less if it was just a bar and eatery.
If Behry hadn't guided me there expertly, I'm not sure I would have found Musica on my own. It was tucked into an alley. Very low key and dark except for the giant neon sign suggesting this was a place to dance. Which, no one did, by the way.
Since it was the album release party for We Are Public Radio, everyone in attendance was getting a copy of the album for free just for coming to the show. Plus, there were three other local bands set to perform. I was a little excited about all of it.
Goodbye River was already on stage when we got there. Female singer who was completely overwhelmed and drowned out by the boys in the band. Probably would have been a decent set if we could hear and understand the chick. Who knows, though.
After Z followed and completely killed it. This was the surprise act of the evening that no one saw coming. In a word: amazing. I made a deal with Behry: I'd buy the drinks if he bought their album and burnt me a copy. He better follow through on his end. I need more of this music.
I don't remember enough about Rhett Edwards to post anything except that he was there and performed something.
We Are Public Radio finally took the stage. They were good. Very, very mellow. I can't say I enjoyed them nearly as much as After Z. I've been listening to the free album since then and my opinions haven't changed. After Z stole the show and my fan loyalty.Too drunk to drive by the end of the night, I passed out in my car and slept it off in a parking deck in downtown Akron before waking up at nearly 6am and driving straight to work for some overtime and a delightful, lingering hangover.
Oh, yeah. I forgot about Bear. Bear is a large Irish guy who drives a crappy minivan. He's not nearly as large as the man in the photo above, but I love that photo and may never have another opportunity to use it in a post, so... Anyway, Bear is hilarious. He dressed up as a leprachuan for Halloween last year. It's the second most hilarious Halloween photo I've ever seen. The most hilarious Halloween photo I've ever seen was of someone dressed as Captain Janeway from Startrek Voyager. I wish I could post both of those photos, but I don't have copies of either. I was merely shown them by Woody.
"Ronnie, I have a confession to make. I showed Joshua a photo of you.""Of course you did. Why? Why would you show him that?"Ronnie was incredibly embarrassed that I had seen his Captain Janeway Halloween costume. Woody had shown it to me a week before and then again after I met Ronnie for the first time. I didn't even make the connection until the second time. He had to shave his beard and everything, but he pulled it off perfectly. He was a dead match for Captain Janeway. It was eery. It was also the best drag attempt I've ever seen. Then Woody made an observation of his own."I think Ronnie thinks you're hot. Otherwise, he would have been proud of that photo. He must like you or he wouldn't have been so embarrassed that I showed you that photo."That was incredibly good news because I had developed a serious man crush on Ronnie since the first time I saw him in person. I wanted to pursue that possibility a little further but I was interrupted by the sudden appearance of bright yellow Jockey briefs thrown dramatically onto the table we were gathered around by some queen who had strutted over from the outdoor bar and exclaimed "I think one of you lost these!"
We hadn't been in the place ten minutes and there was already a pair of underwear on the table. Also partially shown in the photo are Gay Tony and Straight Johnny who we met up with at the gay bar - more friends of Woody from his work. Not shown in the photo because he wasn't present that night would be Straight Ryan, also a friend of Woody from work who apparently was the owner of the underwear in question which he had lost them somehow during a previous visit. Anyway, Ronnie slipped away during the whole fiasco and I didn't see him for the rest of the night. I had lost interest in him way before the end of the night anyway. He was cute, but that was about it. He might have simply been overly embarrassed by the fact that I had seen him in drag from last Halloween, but he was also trying to pick up other guys. That's fine, but my interest ends at that juncture. Besides, I was completely distracted by Akron Leatherman 2012 (his title was conveniently bedazzled on the back of his leather vest) who was in attendance and had decided to pull on the pair of bright yellow Jockeys over his leather get-up and proceeded to dance the night away looking like a more obviously homosexual leather fetish Robin. Meanwhile, I actually ended up spending most of the evening bantering back and forth with his roommate Clay. Clay is a total smart ass which occasionally boarders on assholedom, but... I can be like that, too. We definitely proved to be worthy opponents for each other.There's just something about a bad boy that is difficult to ignore or resist. Or maybe that's just me. Maybe I can't. The same way I'm drawn into ridiculous shenanigans.