Tampa Bay Street Team

After the first round of fruity cocktails the gay jokes flew like rainbow flags. As one of the few non-gay CL staffers marching in the St. Pete Pride Parade, I was the ass of most of their jokes. Byron McMullen told me the bandana trailing from my back pocket (which I had intended for midday sweat collection) was actually a type of gay flag. Turns out that along with rainbows, black leather and Lance Bass, bandanas have been co-opted by the gay community. He directed my confusion to a group of men festooned in piercings, straps of leather and combat boots. I spoke to a man with deeply tanned muscles bulging out of tiny black leather shorts and a sash that read, “Mr. Gay Day Leather 2008.” I figured he was a reliable source. Turns out a bandana hanging out of your back pocket indicates whether you are submissive or dominant, depending on which cheek you wear it on. The colors are also significant: Checkered means safe sex only, yellow is water-sports, black and white mean you are up for anything, and red (the color I was sporting) means you’re into fisting. This wouldn’t have been so troubling had I not already been hit on by a gentleman who insisted on helping me set up the CL tent. And I thought he was just being nice.   

Dykes on Bikes kicked off the parade followed by a fleet of boat floats borrowed from the Gasparilla armory and sufficiently gayified by the likes of the Tampa Bay Bears and men in construction caps. The range of floats was about as diverse as the crowd. Spurs Bar pulled a mobile line dancing stage. Actors from Bath House the Musical wore towels atop a Hummer. My favorite was The ROTC (Righteously Outrageous Twirling Corps) in sailor caps and sleeveless shirts who whirled rainbow flags in a routine that climaxed with a burst of rainbow confetti. Creative Loafing rode second to last on a fire engine rigged with long range squirt guns and a roaring siren to drown out the protestors who brought up the rear.

“I’m slightly offended,” CL’s Senior Editor, Eric Snider, confided in me near the end of the parade. (more…)

Preventing waste was a major theme at the Pinellas Living Green Expo, held last Saturday and Sunday at the Harborview Center in downtown Clearwater. Many of the vendors featured home construction materials that reduce energy waste: thicker windows, foam insulation and low-flow toilets. The current dilemma with going green is that one must purchase more products to be green, and in doing so, generate more waste. This is just a consequence of the movement, being relatively new, and one that is still something of a status symbol for those who can afford to buy hybrids or to build new “green” houses. With this said, I was surprised that the majority of expo attendants were regular folks looking for tricks to save money on their energy bills. There were a few hardcore idealists of the dreadlocked and patchouli variety, aging hippies with gray pony tails, and yuppies uniformed in bicycling spandex, helmets, sunglasses and fanny packs, but they were the minority.

  

One major exception to this good natured crowd were the prize-whoring elderly, dead set on loading free garb in their complementary cloth, grocery sacks. Those who were less agile (or couldn’t simply swipe promo items and run) delivered long oratories about how they loved CL (mostly because it is free) as their justification for leaving the booth with five promotional ball point pens. At times I felt like I was in a Charlie Brown comic strip, sitting at a booth labeled, “the doctor is in.” More than a few told me dramatic sob stories before explaining why they needed an entire stack of temporary tattoos. I tried to scare them away with CL’s latest cover, featuring a pair of pink bumper-balls hanging below a license plate that read “Nutz 2 U,” but they were too blinded by the promise of prizes to be swayed by nuts.

“I need four because I have four grandchildren,” a granny in an electric scooter told me as she took four miniature beer mugs from my table.

Did she even have grandchildren? Would she use the mugs to sort her collection of sugar packets from various fast food joints despite the fact that she’s diabetic? I can’t begin to fathom how excited her grandchildren will be next Christmas when they get matching miniature beer mugs from Grandma. What kills me is that these prize-whores horde promo items like treasure, with the intent of passing it on to their relatives. The reality is that when these pack rats keel over, their heirs will just throw away all the coffee cans full of free pencils and drawers full of stress balls. Perhaps some sort of entrance fee, say the price of bus fare or a pint of blood, would discourage these prize hunters. Or perhaps next year I could set up a booth on how to keep your grandparents from collecting promo garb like Halloween candy. Maybe I’ll give away handcuffs or tazers.

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“I’m partial to the abstract nudes,” I told St. Pete scenester Brent Bruns Saturday at Nova 535 Art Lounge. 

“They’re also the most pornographic,” Brent said. “You think there’s a correlation?” 

I’d be lying if I said I just liked artist Lisa Scholder’s use of color. But that’s the beauty of a place like Nova. People who know what they’re looking at can give qualified opinions about the works in the gallery while people like me can disguise our artistic-handicaps while munching hors d’oeuvres, bouncing between one of several bars and rubbing elbows with Bay Area trend setters.     

 

The 7,000-square-foot warehouse space hosted more than a thousand people Saturday for its red carpet opening. Inside, unfinished floors accentuated the loud art hung over brick walls. San Francisco’s DJ Zeph spun, somehow making hip-hop tracks swanky. Patrons elbowed for room as they roamed between the bars and tables loaded with sweets and the crumbled remains of cheese and crackers. It was overwhelming, even for my camera, which literally fried its archaic circuits trying to capture the madness.   

The crowd was so large I kept losing Trini, though this may have been her intent. She had taken a particular interest in the inordinate proportion of attractive men in attendance. Not only was most everyone more attractive than me, they all dressed like they were in a fashion show. The women, most of whom were also taller than me, wore provocative dresses, which I learned could be as short as they wanted and still be considered classy so long as they cost more than my monthly rent. Guys wore suits, but not business-class black and gray, but suits built to accommodate color. I felt like I had stepped into Eyes Wide Shut or a New York warehouse party.  
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