kenneth in the (212)

Thursday, March 26, 2026

On the Rag, Vol. 900

This week's rag 'n' mag roundup features Martine Souza, Manfred, Steve Howey, Dan Levy, Taylor Ortega, Barry Manilow and more BELOW.

Wednesday, March 25, 2026

Remains of the Day (03/25)

Out: Do men make passes at gay guys in glasses?

ACLU: Mapping attacks on LGBTQ rights in U.S. state legislatures in 2025

Brian Ferrari: When Marianne Faithfull covered After Dark in 1980

SCMP: China still on track to supplant US as world’s No. 1 economy in 10 years, scholar says

Wrestle Wednesday: Calf genetics go crazy -- "thanks, Dad!"

Socialite Life: Alan Ritchson’s neighbor started altercation, sources claim; here’s what the viral fight video didn’t show

Radar: Inside Monica Seles's latest health battle

Out: "Boots" star Angus O'Brien flexes six-pack abs in steamy pic

AFP: Hungary's hard-pressed LGBTQ people say exit of nationalist PM Viktor Orban is only half the battle

PinkNews: Police arrested a 41-year-old Florida woman on a felony child abuse charge after she allegedly cut a young male relative with a knife upon discovering messages and images revealing he was gay

Attitude: German football coach Christian Dobrick comes out as gay: "This charade has drained me"

NYT: What begins as a simple tick bite can turn devastating as alpha-gal syndrome spreads, leaving some patients with a severe red-meat allergy and, in rare cases, death

Interview: Crocodiles, influencers and tennis pros collide as Club Lacoste takes over the Miami Open

Advocate: Meet the LGBTQ disability activist who climbed Mount Kilimanjaro

Instinct: Nearly two years after 19-year-old college student Edward Cornes was found dead in a King’s Cross hotel room following a night with two older men, his drug-related death continues to raise more questions than answers

Hot Cat of the Day: My adorable niece claims she went to college in Vermont because she got a softball scholarship, but I know the real reason!

The Caftan Chronicles: Michael Rajner’s heroic persistence helps stave off a Florida HIV meds crisis -- for now

Driver 8: Talk about your threeway potential ... and we know what a horndog Madison is based on that REVENGE VIDEO!

Tuesday, March 24, 2026

Book 'em, Danno

I still haven't broken my reading habit, so here's the latest:

Having only consumed Joan Didion's two late-in-life memoirs -- "The Year of Magical Thinking" (about her late husband) and "Blue Nights" (about her late daughter) -- I thought it would be fun to read stuff from her heyday. I ended up picking "The White Album," and while I certainly wouldn't say the writing isn't good, as a collection of (then) timely essays it doesn't really hold much interest in 2026. (Not since "Chinatown" has someone been this fascinated by L.A. water, only Joan's no Faye Dunaway.)

I had asked for a recommendation from an older friend who reads a lot but came up short when she told me that she'd never actually read anything by the acclaimed writer because "Joan Didion always seemed like someone you were supposed to read, which was a big turnoff."

From there I finally read Scotty Bowers's infamous "Full Service," which was loaned to me nearly a decade ago by the same friend, who actually heard about it via my blog. When we discussed "how much of it do you think is true?" my friend said she had a hard time believing there were men who would PAY OTHER MEN to perform oral sex on them(!) or that Katharine Hepburn would be a whore for young women. (Um.)

I didn't have a hard time believing the book's contents so much as stomaching them. Call me a prude -- my tags are "vanilla," "vanilla" and "vanilla" -- but after the first few encounters I was kind of getting grossed out by it all.

Suffice to say that I wasn't too surprised to realize upon closer inspection that the copy my friend had loaned me -- which she'd bought used online -- had been "withdrawn" from Cedar Mill Community Library in Portland, Ore., not exactly the censorship capital of the world but even they can only stomach so much. (Sorry, but the shit sandwich was a "kink" too far.)

And then I picked up David Spade's 2015 memoir, which my brother Terence had quasi-recommended because we're both fans and the comedian shares our Detroit-Phoenix upbringing. I'm probably the only person who has read not one but two autobiographies by "Saturday Night Live" alums but wasn't very interested in the "SNL" angle of it all. (Table reads and Lorne Michaels gossip don't really excite me.) But I've always enjoyed Spade -- especially on "Just Shoot Me," which doesn't even get a mention -- and some very strange things have happened to him over the years that made for a fun read.

I also finished my friend Tim Anderson's "Tune In Tokyo: The Gaijin Diaries" -- about his time teaching English in Japan -- and it is HYSTERICAL!

UPDATE: A kind reader just gave me three Didion recommendations -- "Play It as It Lays," "Where I Was From" and "South and West" -- and I'm thinking of starting with the middle one as it's a straightforward memoir, which seems to be my sweet spot these days -- although I must confess this review is already giving me "White Album" flashbacks!. I'm also a Patty Hearst nut dating back to my childhood, so I might give "South and West" a shot, too.