« 9 million people | Main | malkovich, malkovich, malkovich! »
July 14, 2003
jellyfish elvis and sunshine idiots
Saturday found Joe and I down on Pier 4 waiting for the Elvis Costello show. We went down about 3 hours early and parked across the street then meandered down to the Barking Crab for dinner. On the walk toward the Crab, we found a spot in the bay with hundreds of jellyfish. We stood and watched for a while, listening to Elvis warming up back at the Fleet Pavilion. The day was bright, the air was perfect, the jellyfish were wonderful and mysterious and other than the fact that I wore the wrong shoes, the entire world seemed to be in the right place.
Elvis was great, as to be expected. He didn't address the audience much--hardly at all, in fact--but he more than made up for it with the rousing show that he and the Imposters (2/3 of the original Attractions) put on. He played a lot of the more obscure songs, which Joe knew and I didn't, but he did play the most amazing lounge-like version of Watching the Detectives, which I felt was the best song of the night, and not just because I knew it so well. He only played a few popular tunes, (Watching the Detectives, Clubland, What's so Funny about Peace, Love & Understanding, Pump It Up, Every Day I Write the Book), which left me really wishing that he had played She, Alison, Accidents Will Happen and my personal favorite, Veronica. But as Joe pointed out, he's played all those songs so many damn times and he has SO MUCH music that it's perfectly understandable if he is playing his other tunes. I mean, we're talking about a man that will put 25-30 songs on a CD. I guess he's brought a song wheel to some of his past shows and spun the wheel to see what will come up--now that is pretty cool, I think. He does have a powerful voice. He never wavered, he was strong until the very end. Two thumbs up, Elvis!
Sunday we decided late in the day to head to Singing Beach to add to my splotchy tan (a result of uneven suntan lotion, sigh). On the way there, some idiot in a really nice Acura, came flying by us, weaving in and out of traffic and then riding quite literally on the bumper of anyone that was in front of him. We watched him do this in the fast lane and Joe was saying that he was, essentially, an accident waiting to happen.
And it did.
He must have tapped the minivan in front of him, because next thing we knew, there was smoke and screeching and cars swerving everywhere. We were far enough back to be able to slow down and react. Three cars pulled off to the side, and it looked like no one was hurt--the cars weren't even banged up, strangely enough. After we moved past this little fiasco, we quickly realized that the guy wouldn't have made it very far anyway. It was wall-to-wall traffic all the way up the North Shore.
But Singing Beach was beautiful and the water was slightly warmer than Crane's Beach on the Fourth. We ended up down in the gay section, I think...lots of fancy men in tight swimsuits oiling each other up and eyeing each other. I mean, don't get me wrong, some of my dearest and closest friends are gay, but watching gay men in prowling mode is not really my idea of communing with nature.
I think the worst was the old man in a flesh colored sagging speedo with big huge silver nipple rings wandering the beach. His appearance just seemed to scream child molester for some reason. And that makes me wonder about the parents who let their 4 year old girls run around topless at the beach. I realize it's all very innocent and when I was young I'm sure I did the same, but the world is very different now and letting your youngster run around naked in public basically opens them up to the view of some really sick-minded people.
Okay, /rant off, and back to getting stuff done, of which there is a lot...
Posted by crystallyn at July 14, 2003 10:37 PM
Trackback Pings
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.crystallyn.com/cgi-bin/mt/mt-tb.cgi/58
Comments
Certainly it wasn't the nipple rings that screamed "child molester," I hope?
Posted by: Forrest at July 14, 2003 12:08 PM
No no no! I'm not opposed to piercings at all! It was just everything about this man...the 3 inch nipple rings (they were so big it was icky) just sort of sealed the deal (they sagged just like his bathing suit sagged in the back). Mostly it was how he skulked through the crowds wandering the beach. Was just downright creepy.
Posted by: Crystal at July 14, 2003 12:29 PM
OMG. Same guy, clothes on this time, thankfully, out on the pier in Pickering Wharf in Salem, taking pictures of the Friendship of Salem boat. My skin is crawling just thinking of him in that sagging speedo. Blech.
Posted by: Crystal at July 14, 2003 04:43 PM
Speaking of creepy, are you stalking this guy? ;)
Posted by: Sean at July 14, 2003 04:48 PM
*shiver*
Posted by: Crystal at July 14, 2003 04:52 PM
Crystal, I just stumbled onto this website by accident but read a bit of your text. You write very well. But only having this text to go by, you strike me as a frightened person, and are possible transferring your own fears onto unsuspecting old queers. For the record, stats prove that within the American population, child molsters are apt to be, and predominantly heterosexual. (If the old guy with the nipple ring was looking for kids he would have been at the amusement park, not remote section of Crane Beach).
If some of your dearest and closest friends are gay, you'd probably have a little compassion for the old queen. If some of your dearest and closest friends were gay, you would know that queer culture is much more comfortable about cruising people than are heterosexuals. I, for one don't limit my crusing to men, I think women are very pleasing to look at too. That doesn't mean I'm "prowling" after them. And fess up...you check people out too - everyone does, but most heterosexuals are, by the norms and conventions of straight society, too uptight to be obvious and honest about it.
Lastly, about the four-year old girl...bring that one up to your therapist, there's probably some rich territory for you to explore there. I was just at Crane Beach yesterday - I'm gay but I don't know where this notorious gay beach section is so I just camped out right there in the din of moms and dads with all those children. (HORRORS! a gay-boy checking out all those topless little girls, and their daddy's and their mom's.) I'm being facetious in case you can't tell. The world has changed, Crystal. And despite the horrible things that happen, people are becoming more tolerant and accepting of people who are different from themselves. Your writing style give me the impression that you think of yourself as a cool and hip kind of person. I think you're pretty frightened and more conservative than you think. But then, that's just my opion.
Posted by: Marc at August 20, 2003 02:04 PM