Keep getting the peony? The piney?

Did you read the article on Gavin in this week's Newsweek? Here's my favorite part:

Newsom's time as mayor has prepared him for a dramatic fight. Earlier this month he escorted a NEWSWEEK reporter down Market Street, near city hall. Most everyone recognized him—and had something to say. Some were fawning. "I just have to ask you for a picture," said one woman, " 'cause you're the sexiest mayor I've ever seen." Newsom smiled for the camera and demurred: "It's all relative when you're talking about mayors." Others were less fawning. "F––– you, Gavin," a man shouted across a busy intersection. "Get out of my life." Everyone thought they could talk to the mayor as if they knew him, some too well. "Keep getting the p–––y, Gavin," shouted one admiring citizen.

LOLz! Hard to imagine someone shouting "Keep getting the pussy" at Mayor T. M. Franklin Cownie of Des Moines. Although, Christ, Franklin might be the biggest poonhound on the Mississippi, I don't know.

Anyway, the most interesting part of the article is basically about why in the fuck he would commit what seems now like political suicide by ordering the county to issue marriage licenses to gays and basically set off the huge gay marriage fight back in 2004. Before that, he was considered a rising star in the Democratic party and people were saying things like "Governor" and "unlimited potential" and maybe even President. Now the general consensus is he's kind of a joke the party has to keep hidden like Cousin Frank who comes to the reunion and gets shitfaced on Bud Ice and pukes in the trunk of someone's car.

So why would he do such a thing? I can think of three possibilities:

1. He misread the direction the state and the country was going and thought he would be at the vanguard of social change and that everybody would be all GAY MARRIAGE YAY.

2. He was trying to curry favor with the far left, for some reason.

3. He honestly believed it was the right thing to do.

Of these, #3 is obviously the hardest to accept because we've been conditioned to categorically reject the idea that politicians ever do what's right just because it's right. But who knows? Maybe he actually did do it because he believes in his heart it was the right thing to do. Reasons #1 and #2 don't make that much more sense, anyway.

We'll see what happens in the primary race for governor. I don't think he's got much of a shot against Jerry Brown, but God knows I've been wrong before.

Hope you had a good weekend. We're in the process of finalizing our wedding invitations. They're going to look like the cover of "Oh, Inverted World," except with a dark red background. Cool!

Just give me the money and no one gets hurt

I just hied myself on down to Ye Olde Bankrupte Banke to withdraw about $18,000 to fund the TK-Super Hot Irish Girlfriend Wedding Extravaganza that's coming up this summer. Apart from the fact of my mild surprise that YOBB actually had the 18K to give out, my request caused a mild-to-moderate tizzy in the branch.

The teller, who we'll call "Joan" for no particular reason, looked at my withdrawal slip and said, "Eighteen thousand dollars? Do you want that in cash?"

I was a little startled by that question and said no, that a check would be fine. I pictured myself carrying a paper bag full of bundles of twenties out of the bank. Would they drop a die pack in just out of force of habit?

Joan consulted with a nearby teller and opined that she wouldn't mind it being deposited into her account. I bet, Joan! I provided, upon request, a driver's license and major credit card. Calls were then placed to higher-ups.

Joan and Higher-Up consulted telephonically about how to handle this unforeseen circumstance. Information from my CDL was transmitted. Joan then asked the puzzling question of where I lived BEFORE the address on my license. That was like 10 years ago and I had to think hard. I finally came up with the street name and, after some reflection, the street number as well. I guess I got it right, because our little game of This Is Your Life continued.

Meanwhile, I have selected a blue lollipop from a bowl on the counter and have been busily sucking away at it. SHIG informs me that my entire mouth - teeth, tongue, lips - is now a rich blue color. Will this affect me getting the money?

Oh, here's Joan. "What state were you born in?" I only have to think about this one for a second, and I got it right, too!

Joan asks who to make the check out to, and jokes for the second time that she'd like it in her account. BACK OFF, JOAN. YOU'RE NOT GETTING THE MONEY. It goes into SHIG's name for deposit in her account, for various complicated financial reasons that I'm not at liberty to discuss. We walk across the street and immediately deposit it into her account. She looks gleeful.

I haven't heard from her in over an hour. Starting to get worried.

Have a good weekend!

Media I am absorbing right now

TV: Lost

Now entering the 5th season, this sci-fi/time travel/soap opera/mindfuck/excuse for Josh Holloway to walk around without a shirt on continues to confuse and entertain, along with annoying Super Hot Irish Girlfriend because every few minutes I ask her "Now what just happened? Who's that?" Plus, Evangeline Lilly!

Music: The Streets, Original Pirate Material

Just came back to this 2002 release and it still sounds great. Mike Skinner's genius idea was to rap about everyday life for a regular bloke in Britain. Forget Benzes and Cavalli furs; he's talking about getting fucked up on lager and getting into fights and not calling girls back too soon so you don't look desperate.

Important note for American listeners: "Geezers" means "guys" in British, not "old people." This album may be very confusing if you don't know that.

Book: Born Fighting: How the Scots-Irish Shaped America, by Sen. Jim Webb

Forget the English Cavalier artistocracy and the prim New England Puritans. The Scots-Irish were the mongrel pioneers who settled much of Appalachia and are the ancestors of most of what we consider the White Middle Class today. Jim Webb, a senator from Virginia, has a bit of an overblown style, but the history is fasciniating, especially if you're one of them, like I am.

Movie: 28 Days Later

Just saw this a couple of nights ago. Nice, creepy little quasi-zombie movie, except the zombies are really really fast and not exactly the undead. Oddly, screenplay by Alex Garland, who also wrote the hippie backpacker's ur-fable, The Beach.

Web: Evany's dispatches from Sundance

Typically hilarious.

Civic Center Plaza, Jan. 20

Good speech, but man, you gotta practice that oath of office ahead of time!

OK. Where my change at?

Weekend in Review

Friday evening around 5:40 found Super Hot Irish Girlfriend and I at the Argus Lounge on Mission for some pre-dinner drinks. Notable: Stack of Playboys on the bar; enormous yellow Lab brought in by customer; Trumer Pils on tap.

Dinner was at the Blue Plate up the street. Notable: Excellent meatloaf; very good focaccia; pretty good pork.

Then drinks at Knockout back down the street. I've only been to Knockout when it was really really really crowded, so it was kind of nice to go and sit at the bar and enjoy it as a bar and not a jampacked sweatfest. Notable: Hipsters!

Saturday I met up with SHIG after band practice at the 3300 Club, a pretty awesome dive where we were the youngest people there. Notable: The guy with the pronounced Scottish brogue telling a profanity-laced story at TOP FUCKING VOLUME. Also, when SHIG declined to order anything by saying "I'm fine," the bartender replying "I know you are, love." Awesome.

So we were going to go get some Japanese but decided at the last minute to go to Emmy's instead. Amazingly, there was no wait. That's never happened before. Notable: The Ruby Red Martini. DFL. The food was just OK. Also, Hipsters!

Then we went to Oakland to see our friends The Morning Line at the Starry Plough. They sounded great, especially considering they hadn't played a show in like a year. Notable: One girl dancing like a grasshopper on meth. She was very enthusiastic!

Yesterday I went back to the East Bay to watch some NFL playoffs at Stephen and Jessica's. Then we went to eat at Filippo's in Rockridge. It was better than I expected, for sure. Notable: The chicken piccata was delicious. The gnocchi it came with was good, too, but the pesto sauce left a little to be desired.

After-dinner drinks down the street at McNally's, which feels more or less like every bar I went to when I was a freshman in college. Notable: Another enormous fucking yellow Lab. Where are these people getting all these pony-sized Labrador Retrievers?

So, as is apparent, that's a lot to pack into one weekend. Luckily today is a holiday and I can sleep in, right? WRONG. Apparently it's not a holiday for the construction crew that's disassembling the sidewalk in front of my house beginning at 8 a.m. Fuck.

My backyard vs. cover of R.E.M.'s "Murmur"

My backyard:



Cover of R.E.M.'s "Murmur":

We're totally going to go to Colicchio's place

Planning a wedding is kind of a drag. So far, I've nailed down the tent guy and the caterer and the photographer. I think we have a bartender. We still have lots of odds and ends to take care of. I understand now why people have wedding planners.

Anyway, it's much more fun planning the honeymoon. Right now, it's looking like 3 days in NYC and then a week in Turks and Caicos. Pretty fucking awesome. We're currently selecting restaurants in New York where we want to go. In T&C, I figure we'll pretty much just exist on whatever fruit they put into a mai tai.

Happy Friday, everyone!

If I admit to watching The Real World, would you think less of me? That's OK, because I have to get this out: this new season SUCKS. It's like they went out of their way to find the most boring people they could. I mean, c'mon, you've got a transgendered person and a Mormon guy who's gayer than Christmas but thinks he's straight and the obligatory tatted-up San Francisco barista activist, and it's still fucking boring? Take me back to the days when they just casted a bunch of really hot people and then let the free booze flow. Yes, Las Vegas, aka the Best Season Ever.

OK. Heading out into the 72-degree late-January heat to give a speech in Berkeley, then meeting Super Hot Irish Girlfriend for drinks and dinner back in civilization. Have a good weekend!