My transatlantic voyage of August 2008 was probably a life changing experience. I went to Edinburgh, Scotland for the weekend to see my brother’s performance in the Fringe Festival. I can’t tell if I’m just still reeling from it all, or if it actually left a big impression on me, but I’m fairly certain I want to live in the United Kingdom at some point in my life. Preferably sooner rather than later.

First let us discuss air travel. I’m going to say it: my father is a genius. I guess one of the perks of traveling twice as much as you’re used to when you get a new boss is that your lofty amount of accrued frequent flyer miles allows you to upgrade an entire family trip to First Class! There is really no option, when traveling across an ocean, other than First Class. I hadn’t traveled in First Class since I was ten (also pre-911), so I had forgotten the bliss of an elite seating assignment. There is the seat size - La-Z-Boy competitive, if i do say so myself. The service - drinks galore, any newspaper you want, meals (as in, more than a box of nuts). And most importantly, there are the seats that transform into beds. Beds! Yes, I full-on went to sleep in a bed over the Atlantic Ocean, and my bed had a TV, too.

At the last minute it turned out to be cheaper to fly from Baltimore to Detroit to Amsterdam to Edinburgh, than to just fly direct to Edinburgh, so we had a lot of fun airport adventures over the weekend. Edinburgh’s airport is so small it doesn’t even have those walkways that take you directly to the plane’s door - you have to walk out directly onto the tarmac. Conversely, Amsterdam’s airport is so monstrous that there are actually two walkways per plane - one to the front and one to the rear. And Detroit’s airport is pretty standard.

It was awesome flying in over Amsterdam and Edinburgh. The European landscape, though still green and brown, is unlike anything in North America. The Netherlands, sometimes formerly called the Low Countries, are literally low. Flat. Most of the country probably has an elevation of 7 feet. Over 20 miles inland we were still flying over farms irrigated by troughs dug out of the earth and filled with runoff from the North Sea, which looks really cool from 5000 feet up. Scotland is a thousand different shades of green and brown. The country is pretty hilly, and the mountains are called Munros, not mountains. I saw three golf courses flying in, and rumor has it the sport was invented in Scotland. It was really just beautiful looking down through the clouds and seeing the hilly green landscape (and a thousand sheep, ha).

Expect a full-on family lovefest in Part 2.

Goddammit. The one week I’m out of town and New York Magazine actually has a cover story I’m interested in! Oh Rafael Nadal, please come live with me.

Well, yeah, the face has got to go, but I’d certainly prefer this to a box of Wheaties.

My magical sabbatical was actually a weekend in Scotland to surprise my brother at his performance in the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.  Edinburgh was amazing, and the trip was definitely something I’ll remember for the rest of my life.  My maiden voyage across the pond!  Expect a full recap of my awesome adventure later in the week.

I’m going on an adventure this weekend.  It’s a secret adventure where I will play with unicorns and dragons and high schoolers.  All such magical creatures.  I’ll write a full synopsis when I return.  For now just know that I’ll be away for a few days, so someone has to cover the Kylie and Tyra news in my absence.

Apparently there will be a transgender woman competing on Cycle 11 of America’s Next Top Model. Yay! I guess I’m a little late to this party. Clearly from the heavily hyper-linked first sentence of this post, this development has already been covered ad nauseum in the media, but I wanted to put in my two cents. I agree with Rich, as I do on most things, that this is a major flip-flop for ANTM. I don’t remember on which cycle it was, one of the early ones when Janice Dickinson was still a judge, but there has already been a transgender woman hopeful in Claudia Charriez who was denied because of her alternative lifestyle. Booooo! I mean, Claudia was a badass model. She was the transgender version of Jaslene. Or… well. Yeah. Anyway, she was really good. The fact that ANTM is now allowing transgender women to compete is good, but also bullshit. It’s like “Hi! I’m Tyra Banks. Remember how we had a girl with lupus, and a girl with Asperger syndrome (which I couldn’t define for anyone), and a girl with mutilated genitals? Well, now we have a girl who used to have a penis! I’m soooo progressive you guys! My name is Tyra Banks, and I’m progressive. Tyra. Banks. Tyrabanks.”

Those Chinese gymnasts are not 16.  The competition is already over, and any medals awarded to the USA team at this point are going to be viewed as pity medals, but those Chinese girls are not all 16.  I’m just sayin’.

It’s called either “Fuck You Very Much,” “Guess Who Batman?,” or “Get Wit the Brogram.” Who the hell knows. But it’s really good.  It’s a “fuck you” song with bright and cheery music just like her first single, “Smile,” and it has the lyrics “so you say it’s not okay to be gay / well I think you’re just evil / you’re just some racist who can’t tie my laces / your point of view is medieval”.  Love.  I can’t find a file to add it to my Muxtape, so I’ve included some wonky chopped down version of the YouTube illegality below.  Enjoy it!

Imagine my surprise when I woke up groggy and disoriented today to find a brand new Kylie music video. I knew she was releasing “The One” as her new single, but I forgot that I was going to get a music video out of it too. And it is quite possibly the gayest music video she’s made since “Can’t Get You Outta My Head”. I mean, there’s a well-muscled man in patterned briefs dancing in front of an LED screen. So, yeah. It’s good. Check it out below.

American Apparel, the company founded by misogynistic hipster Dov Charney, has traditionally catered to heterosexual men and women in their advertising campaigns.  There has yet to be a man featured on the billboard above Sugar on Houston and Allen - right now there’s some girl in leggings with her butt cheeks bisected by a thong leotard.  There was one instance where the company made an ad to be featured in the Dutch gay magazine BUTT, but (ha) they have generally featured women with their legs spread wide open, or topless with their tongues on a man’s crotch in their ads.  So, it came as a surprise when I saw this ad in the sidebar on Towleroad!  For Him, indeed!  Yeah it’s only promoting the men’s line, but if that isn’t a post-coital cuddle, I don’t know what is.  (And I do.)  And it’s not in a gross, “Hey, look at my vadge!” kind of way, either!  So, thanks, American Apparel, for catering to gay men in a less-obviously-raunchy-than-usual way.  I will continue to get my over-priced cotton underwear and v-neck tees from you.