Friday, September 25, 2009

Legends of the Fall

Just got home a little while ago from the fundraiser for the National Equality March on Washington in the downstairs lounge at Elmo. Michael and I actually ended up having dinner at the restaurant upstairs beforehand, with Scooter and Sloan (and later Russell and some girl he brought). We had a bird's eye view of all the gayrrivals -- lots of well-groomed men ready to toss back some free vodka for a good cause. (From what I was hearing, the night was a HUGE success.)

Tthe highlight of the evening was hearing the legendary Cleve Jones give the crowd a pep talk about the importance of this march in the fight for equality, but not before telling us that he knew we were probably disappointed that Emile Hirsch (who played him in "Milk") wasn't there instead, but he used to be as hot as Emile and that we should all enjoy being young because one day soon we'll all look like him. (Classic!!!) Christine Quinn, the speaker of the City Council, did her part too, reminding us that everyone -- the White House, Congress, the news media and Albany -- will judge the validity of our movement based on turnout.

While I think there's plenty of truth to what they were both saying, I still couldn't help but get think back to my earlier concern: is NOW really the right time -- NOW that has such minimal advance planning. (I honestly didn't know the march was 100 percent a-go until last night!) I don't know about you, but I had to select my vacation days for 2009 during the first two weeks of January, so I can't even begin to think about getting that weekend off. But I digress. I feel a cold coming on, but I was there to have fun, check out the crowd and jump on a few photo opportunities, and jump I did:

With blogger Andy Towle and the legend Gilbert Baker, creator of the Gay Pride Flag

With the man and the myth himself, Cleve Jones

With the legends Michael and Scooter

Perhaps the only way the night could have been better is if I hadn't spent the majority of it being fearful for my life, imagining a fire breaking out and being trampled to death down in the basement (the place got REALLY CROWDED for a moment there). For more information, click HERE.

P.S. Did anyone else notice the downstairs bar looks eerily similar to the set of
"The Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour"?

1 comment:

Travis said...

Woof to Andy!