Grinning Politicians, and Sweat Soaked Drag Queens. It Must Be The Gay Parade.

 (My Friend Rudy, 1988 Chicago parade)

Yesterday, Sunday, was the annual Stonewall Gay Parade and Street Festival here in our town. Unfortunately, because I forgot to bring a camera and I have no idea how to get photos from my cell phone to my computer, I can't show any of it to you. That's too bad because some of it cannot be described in words alone, but I'll try.

Tossing aside the successful practice of having the parade in the early evening, this year they put it on at eleven in the morning. Now that wouldn't be so bad if you are living in say, Nome Alaska, but here in South Florida in the summer, eleven in the morning is like sitting under a French fry lamp at McDonald's. Add to that, ninety percent humidity, and you have the worst case scenario for drag queens riding on floats. In what seemed like a scene from a horror movie, float after float, and convertible after convertible, passed by carrying Ru Paul wannabes with their faces melting, and the cheap makeup running down their sweat soaked gowns.

Interspersed with the melting drag queens were the politicians. I guess it is kind of nice that times have changed, and instead of being pariahs, gays are now considered valuable voters to be catered to. Unfortunately for the politicians, they have now become the pariahs. At least I was entertained when the county mayor who passed the one bite, your dog is dead law, Ken Keechl, came by on a truck, and Mark started screaming "Dog killer!" at the top of his lungs. This caused the perfectly coiffed politician to break out in a shit eating, sweaty grin, and provoked questions from all around us as to why we would scream at that nice looking man

All in all we had a pretty nice time, even if I came close to having heat stroke, and Mark came close to being run over by the truck carrying Ken Keechl. However, I think wandering up and down the street at eleven in the morning with a drink in my hand is just too damn early. At least when they held the parade in the evening my ice didn't melt nearly as fast.