Fancy a dip?

Via Sticky (Work Unfriendly): Marco Antônio Arcoverde Cals for H Magazine.

THE NEW MARLENE: Preview Madonna's MDNA Tour on Epix.

First-ever film adaptation of a David Sedaris piece to open Outfest.

Herndon Graddick resigns as GLAAD director after a year.

Will Harry Reid really go nuclear this time?

President Obama is squeaky-clean, conservatives can't get over it. 

I'LL TAX YOU FIRST: Tagged as a hate group...by Bette Midler.

Colin Egglesfield is attractive.

Sentences can end in prepositions.

Beating up on gays via court, and more literally.

New gay dads (my pals) Matt & Josh meet their new twins:

Download Video as MP4

Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nevada) wins a biggie on taxes—the middle-cass tax cut is extended, and was voted on separately from the tax cut for the wealthy. Guess whose tax cut will not be getting extended?

Prove it!

As of midnight last night, it was exactly six years since my first post. It's been a tough thing to keep up with a dayjob and outside activities, and just when I think I might walk away, a valuable connection or interesting opportunity or a kind word comes my way. Thank you all for reading me.

Of whom are you more jealous?

Here are my favorite 100+ posts out of nearly 11,000. Please take some time to read (or re-read!) a couple and tweet or Facebook any you like.

xoxo Matt

The pocket pool championships were intense this year

BOY CULTURE

Boy-crazy

FROM BOY TO MAN: BC B.C. (2007): The entire history of my novell and novel Boy Culture as well as the movie version; might be my ultimate post.

Jonathon Trent & Derek Magyar make an Allan Brocka sandwich

BOY ON FILM (2006): An account of the NYC launch party for Boy Culture as it played the TriBeCa Film Fest.

I was left "Reeling" by the experience

FRIENDS AND "FAMILY" (2006): The movie version of Boy Culture hits Chicago.

No one would've mistaken me for Taylor Lautner

RAPT PUPIL (2006): The final night of Outfest with Boy Culture; I was fat but on the other hand got to meet Bryan Singer.

 

MY ART

 

Construction worker (shot this week) vs. James Dean

GUYDAR (since at least January 17, 2008) & ENDS OF THE WORLD (since at least January 13, 2008): Attractive men of the world—I got your backs. Your fronts, too.

i-i-i (phone)

Not totally built

Unaltered iPhone image that still blows me away

"Your pictures suck" (2008): An art critic attacks me, but not without sustaining some hits in return.

Let's call it a draw

DRAWN TOGETHER (2008): How my desire to draw related to my secret desire. One of my absolute favorite posts.

The shirtless one

LOST ANGELES (2009): My favorite photographic travelogue of L.A.

Even then, New Yorkers feared 9/11 was the beginning of the end

ART IMITATES LIFE (2006): My 9/11 and my distaste for grief tourism.

ME

Death of the party—Jeff in high school, already halfway through his life

BURNING MAN (2007): Tribute to my late high school friend and first romance.

Signed, sealed (eventually) delivered

LOST BOY FOUND (2011): There is a book in here somewhere.

Be Italian

CIAO HOUNDS: OUR TRIP TO ITALY (2011): Finally got José to Europe.

Death becomes here

ILLINOIS DEATH TRIP (2007): Ruminations on death while revisiting a past home, and the past.

Life is short...and meaningful

PASSING BY (2008): Mourning the loss of a person I only met once.

Lots more...

I know he has his detractors—I have criticized some of his actions but acknowledge and appreciate the good he's done as well—but seeing Lt. Dan Choi receive his West Point ring back from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is priceless:

"A repudiation and a refusal" of second-class citizenship (note: not a "refutal," Mz. Palin)

But then, so is this:

"People will look back on this moment and wonder why it was ever a source of controversy in the first place..."

                                 —President Barack Obama

Smiles all around + "Yes, we did!"

Moments ago, calling it "the right thing to do, period," President Obama signed the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell into law.

After appearing almost speechless at first, the president recounted a touching WWII story of a gay soldier who risked his life to save the life of a fallen comrade. Then, the president thanked Democrats and Republicans who put "conviction before politics" to get this done, name-checking Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, Rep. Steny Hoyer, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Sen. Joe Lieberman, Sen. Susan Collins, Sen. Carl Levin, Rep. Susan Davis, Rep. Barney Frank and Rep. Patrick Murphy ("a veteran himself who helped lead the way in Congress"), pictured. The mention of Murphy's name earned him a standing O from the packed crowd.

He praised the "courage and wisdom" of Secretary Gates and Admiral Mike Mullen ("who spoke from the heart and said what he believed was right")—Mullen, too, was awarded an O. General James Cartright and William Lind of the Joint Chief and the authors of the Pentagon review were also noted.

Minutes ago, the Senate achieved cloture on the stand-alone repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell, effectively meaning: It's over. We won. (Or we will once debate is over and the final vote happens. UPDATE: It's over.) Once it became clear this was a done deal, more senators voted in favor than were expected to, including Kirk, Conrad and Voinovich, along with Collins, Snowe, Brown and Murkowski. But not before John McCain made a horrifying speech claiming soldiers would lose limbs over this repeal, echoing the sentiments of Marine Corps honcho Amos.

Credit to Joe Lieberman (finally! he must really want to be re-elected!) for pulling this together, to Harry Reid for scheduling the vote in such a way that it would pass, to all the tireless activists who bitched and moaned (the squeaky activist gets the oil) and finally to President Obama...what looked like a miserable failure for him only a week ago is now a real feather in his cap. Would have preferred he do this before the eleven-and-a-halfth hour, but the end result is what matters. An historic day.

Just don't ask about the DREAM Act....

Get well soon!

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has scheduled a vote on the stand-alone Don't Ask, Don't Tell repeal bill—it will happen Saturday morning. This should ensure that Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Oregon)—who's preparing for surgery to battle prostate cancer—will get a chance to vote. And we'll need every single vote we can get.

And Harry Reid is on board...this could be very interesting after all:

Now that President Lieberman Obama has sold out the Democrats by agreeing to extend the Bush tax cuts (who cares that we can't afford it? we can't afford the wars either, but he's extended those, too), Harry Reid and his posse of pussies better damn well stay in session as long as it takes to get DADT voted out of existence. "We need to leave by December 17!" is meaningless. You work through the holiday. Who wouldn't skip a Christmas in order to vote on the defense bill and get rid of DADT before the courts do it and make fools of them all?

P.S. All the assholes who've howled how Obama is a Socialist dying to raise taxes can suck it right alongside all us assholes who've howled how Obama couldn't possibly be this unprepared to manage his own agenda.

Following President Obama urging Sen. Carl Levin (D-Michigan) to keep the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell in the military-spending bill, here's the first decent thing Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Connecticut) has done in forever—heading up that press conference calling attention to the fact that he and many others in the Senate still want to repeal Don't Ask, Don't Tell. He says we have the 60 votes, so it's all up to Sen. Majority Leader Reid (D-Nevada) to make sure that the bill is open for debate, as Republicans have insisted upon.