Aaron’s endoscopy went very well yesterday. He had another endoscopy 3 months ago and they discovered he had an ulcer which they’ve been treating with medication and therapy. Yesterday’s procedure revealed that the ulcer is gone! This was a wonderful outcome. And the wait time for the procedure was greatly reduced this time – we were essentially in and out in about an hour.
I traded texts with Glenn, my nephew Jon and my cousin Ariel. Glenn was concerned for Aaron. Jon and I were talking about Daredevil: Born Again. Ariel invited us to her graduation party, which will be held in Michigan, despite her living in Georgia. We’ll see how that plays out. I also later traded messages with my old friend Flordeperla, who was a co-worker at Starbucks in Manhattan.
He was a little groggy after and I was dealing with another migraine. I always have lots of migraines, but this time of year, when we get far more rain, it’s always the worst. I went to bed relatively early, hoping that I’d wake up early this morning to get some work on my site done, headache free. Part of that was true. I woke up early. And my headache isn’t as bad as it was.
I have gotten a lot finished! But it’s in a draft stage so nobody can see it yet. It’s part of the Star Trek viewing order section. I also uploaded a bunch more LGBTQ+ movie reviews from 2024 yesterday.
I’m not sure what’s on my agenda for the day. It’s very sunny outside this morning. The weather says a high of 63 this afternoon. Maybe I’ll get outside. Aaron has a trip to Philly planned this evening. Maybe I’ll go out then? Or maybe I’ll start my new Star Trek book? I’ve been having a lot of trouble finishing books in the last couple of years. I was doing really well; I was re-reading The Wicked Years in hopes of reading the sequel trilogy for the first time, but then they announced 2 new books, set earlier in the timeline and it killed my interest. I figured I’d wait a bit for those and then do the whole thing again. And I’ve stumbled over everything since then.
The new Trek book is a sequel to Star Trek: Picard, set during a time-jump in the series finale (S03E10 “The Last Generation”) the book has been described as continuity porn, filled with references to various Star Trek episodes from multiple series and films – which sounds like just the kind of thing that I might enjoy at the moment. So, that’s definitely an option. Plus, as the book features Seven and Raffi, we have our LGBTQ+ representation right there. Nice. But who knows if I’ll finish this one? I’ve wanted to finish everything I’ve started in the last few years; I didn’t begin anything with the intent to stop reading, so we’ll see how it goes.
Oh. And I spoke, briefly, with my sister Janice before I passed out. She tried talking to me about her conspiracy theories about 9/11 but I told her I couldn’t listen to it. 9/11 stuff gives me nightmares and always has. I imagine it would likely be worse now that I’ve lived in Manhattan for nearly 14 years. I wish she had more time to relax. She’s always so busy, even on her days off. I love her. She can make me laugh like almost nobody else. Aaron is good at it too. I’m feeling sleepy again and might go back to bed for a nap. I actually didn’t sleep very long last night. I was in bed quite early but it took me a long time to get to sleep and then I was only out for about 5 hours.
I slept about 6 hours last night. I felt rested. When I got up I started working on a Marvel multiverse viewing order for my website but it’s slow going as I’m having to do the art and fill in information that I didn’t have before. I made a lot of progress though. But I’m struggling with something that has been bothering me for awhile, trying to figure out how to highlight essential elements vs. items included strictly for completionism. I’m also including (or want to include) supplemental materials for a more enriched experience, but I don’t know how to list those things in a cohesive manner. So, unlike other lists and entries I don’t have the pay off of publishing it because I’m not even close to being finished, so it’s just a saved draft for now.
And that sucked up hours of my day, which I hadn’t planned for. It seems beautiful out but I’m struggling with a migraine now, and the energy I had yesterday seems completely depleted. My own weaknesses are cropping up and I hate it. I’m not sure what’s going on with me today exactly, except that one of my new medications tends to stay in my system longer than I think it should. But it’s also helping me to not take Ambien every night and I only have 4 more doses so this problem will pass in time.
In the last 24 hours I’ve also tried to make notes about a possible third entry in my Sex Essays. I have tons of material to write about but I haven’t yet found a framework for the next entry; there’s no contextual outline or structure that might eventually entrap the next tale into a consistently harmonious telling. Once I find something, I’ll know, and it will likely flow relatively quickly. That’s how the first two entries worked, even if I did write them almost 10 years apart. I definitely want to get more written in the coming weeks and months.
Also, my conversations with Michael yesterday left me feeling a bit confused. There are elements of that relationship that have stayed with me ever since. Some of that is PTSD, which I have failed to conquer, although I have identified most of that and explained it to Aaron and my friends and family, so they can understand my reactions to things that seem like red flags, and they are, but they are warning signs for something that actually happened about 15 years ago, rather than anything that’s happening now. Part of me is stuck back there and despite my best efforts I just can’t free myself from that mess. The other part is a complicated sexual component that predates my 2 year relationship with Michael, but was greatly amplified by my experiences with him and then continued on long after we parted. It’s something that I’ve tried very hard to explore and understand, and sometimes I feel that I do. I feel like the work of understanding these things is important and that had I not tried I would have suffered more. I wish I had the foresight to have explored these elements of my personality years before, but I can only try my best. I will continue to explore this topic. Just talking about it here, it’s clear that there is much to write about, and perhaps that could help as well. I’m just not sure if I have any concrete conclusions to highlight in such a piece. But maybe that could be the whole point?
I miss Aaron. I’ve not had any meaningful conversations with him since Monday. I know that he’s very busy so I’m not too distressed about it, but when we spoke on the phone yesterday he seemed odd? I don’t know what that’s about and I’m not sure I will until we can talk about it a bit more.
Glenn sent me a message awhile ago. He said that he really likes Christian a lot, and that they had some fun conversations about me. But he didn’t explain. And I’m not sure what a conversation about me would entail. Glenn did say that my history would make a great play, and he also thought I should do standup, and I do genuinely love Christian, so I’m sure it was all innocent fun, but I’m left wondering what it all means.
So, my “date” with Glenn went well, despite several delays. I made it outside again. I took the train despite not having my music (my headphones didn’t charge for some reason). And all was eventually right with the world. I even ate. There was wonderful conversation, a lot of laughter and some real emotion. Followed by a terrific show at 54 Below, where we both knew many of the people involved. It was great fun. And the music they played before and after the show was surprisingly goth, with songs by Siouxsie and the Banshees and Type O Negative. Interesting. I was very tired by the end of the night and we were driving several people back to the Heights with us so we said goodnight to Glenn and Christian and so many others. But it was a wonderful night.
Arriving home after a fun night out. 04-16-26
I was a little bummed that there was no Avengers: Doomsday trailer waiting at home for me, but they did show a trailer at CinemaCon; they just haven’t released it to the public and I’m not sure they ever will. The first trailer for Avengers: Endgame was shown at a con and they never ever released that trailer publically. We’ll see.
It was revealed that Kathryn Newton will be returning as Cassie Lang / Stature in “Avengers: Doomsday” – which we didn’t know. And young Wesley Holloway has been announced for the film and is rumored to be playing Steve and Peggy’s son.
They did release the final trailer for The Mandalorian & Grogu, which I think looks fantastic!
I need to go finish getting ready for bed. I’m dead tired.
slept very well. Then I cuddled with Aaron for 2 hours. I feel good. But I dreaded reading last night’s post as I really was tripping – but hey, it’s not bad! I have an on and off addiction to sleeping pills. I’ve been cutting back a bit. And this has made them hit me much harder. I say that like I’m tripping acid, and I can only imagine how hard that would hit me because I’m very much a lightweight. When Ambien hits me hard I see pretty colors and if I’m reading, the words drift off the page. That was happening last night while I was typing and it was like the words were floating out of the screen, which is when I realized what was happening. lol It hasn’t hit me like that in years.
I really am into Tori Amos’s “From the Choirgirl Hotel”, which again, was an album I listened to a lot when I was creating the original gothboy.com website. I keep going back to it. She has a new album that I haven’t listened too yet, but I’m content with this one for now.
I think I’m losing weight. I haven’t lost a lot, I’m sure, but I feel like I’m losing weight, which was a goal of mine, but not one that I’ve given a lot of thought to. I have a very complicated relationship with food. I have PTSD which is tied into food. And beyond that I was also raised in an environment where my education related to food was far from normal. And on top of all of that, I have idiopathic gastroparesis, or at least I’ve been told that I do – there is another diagnosis which I can’t remember, but they’re similar and it actually might be both. So it’s complicated.
04-14-26. Just before leaving home to get some food.
I am, however, making healthier choices of late. I was eating a lot of ice cream over the last several years. I think 3 quarts a week was my average? I’ve totally cut ice cream from my diet, which doesn’t mean I won’t potentially have it at Dairy Queen or something, but that I don’t keep any at home. Instead I drink smoothies, which means I replaced something unhealthy with something far more useful, which gives me everything I got from the ice cream but with none of the negative side effects. I’ve also cut way back on bread. I’m still eating bread, but less. Less cheese as well. For over a year I added cheese to nearly everything. To be fair, I was also adding chia seeds and flax seeds, but now I’m eating less cheese and just as many of the seeds. I also started buying fresh kiwi and snacking on that, which I’d wanted to do for years, which must sound strange, but again, my relationship with food is complicated. Oh, and the smoothies mean I’m having fruit every day! Which was definitely NOT the case before. And beyond the food choices, I’m starting to get out a lot more. Since the pandemic in 2020, I’ve mostly been a hermit when I’m in New York. I would maybe leave home 4 or 5 times a month, but there were times when I wouldn’t go outside for weeks at a time. But it is now April 16 and I’ve been outside 9 times this month and I have plans to go out tonight. I went out on the 14th as well, to pick up a pizza. Cheese and bread! But again, I’m eating far less and a healthier variety. For about a year we’ve been getting Little Caesars where we get 2 pizzas, one of them being the pretzel crust, which has so much salt that it has a warning on it! We had them delivered, always, so due to the cost we had to spend more to save a little on the delivery. But now I’m walking to the store, picking up one pizza, not two, and not getting the pretzel crust – saving money, getting exercise, eating less and eating healthier. And still having a pizza. But I have a slice, maybe two a day so it lasts just under a week.
04-15-26. At the A Train station at 181st.
Speaking of outside. I went for a walk yesterday. I was planning on going to my favorite park, Fort Tryon, but it was a bit later than I planned on and then just as I was getting ready to leave there were a flurry of messages from Aaron and Glenn about tonight’s events. I did try to go to the park but decided I’d take the train rather than walk there, only the train was late and I decided to just walk home so I could get myself a ticket to a show tonight, if I needed one. I stopped and got those kiwis on the way home at a new neighborhood market. I got all the things ready. I had a smoothie. Later as a snack I had some green olives, pecans, & sunflower seeds. I played some Zelda (Breath of the Wild) and then got ready for bed, which is when I posted last night.
Aaron and I have been chatting while he gets ready for work. He just looked over my shoulder and saw how I was organizing this post and told me he liked what I was doing: “I see what you’re doing. I’m picking up what you’re putting down. That’s a very handsome man on that subway!” lol
I’m looking forward to going out tonight. I’ll likely leave here shortly after 6. I’m meeting Glenn for a reservation at Serafina in midtown at 7. Then we need to be at 54 Below at 9, for the 9:30 show; the venue is just a few blocks away so we should be fine. And then the show is from 9:30 to 10:30 with another show at 11 so the venue needs to clear out quickly, and I’ll catch a ride home with Aaron and another one of the judges.
With Christian and Aaron. March 21, 2026.
Right. So after Glenn asked if we could meet today, Aaron told me our friend Christian was having a concert that night but I figured I should keep my plans with Glenn so I told Aaron I wasn’t going. Then yesterday Glenn asked if I’d like to go to that same show with him! It felt fated at that point. I mean, Glenn didn’t even realize that I knew Christian or that Aaron would be there! lol It’s so funny. But I’m happy it worked out this way. Aaron and I chilled with Christian last month after a Stonewall Chorale concert.
“Jaws” and “Guardians of the Galaxy” are forever linked in my mind due to my first real meeting with Glenn in August of 2014.
I’ve never hung out with Glenn one on one, which seems odd, in retrospect. I’ve hung out with his ex-wife a few times (who I adore). I usually see Glenn at parties or shows, but there have been smaller gatherings. I met him in passing in 2014, but didn’t officially meet him until August of that year, when we saw him in “The Magic Flute” on Martha’s Vineyard, which was my first opera; I just saw my 14th opera a few weeks ago. We stayed in the same house. Aaron, Glenn, his kids, and there were others there too. We swam in the ocean, near where “Jaws” was filmed. This was the weekend of August 1st, 2014. I know because Aaron and I always try to see the new Marvel films on opening night and we missed the opening of “Guardians of the Galaxy” to be on the island. Glenn and islands. I hadn’t thought of that before. We met in passing in Manhattan, then Martha’s Vineyard, and we’ve visited him twice on Mackinac Island, where his family has a home. Funny.
“Avengers: Doomsday” is likely to be teased at CinemaCon tonight.
Anyways, I’m excited for tonight. But, speaking of Marvel, tonight Marvel will be presenting at CinemaCon and I was hoping to just sit at home and take in the news, but I’m skipping Marvel to chill with Glenn and company. History repeating itself. lol
