Stephen's Den

Tom and I got up from the table at Souper Salad, the place I tend to frequent after church on Sundays.
“We’re off” Tom announced “Stephen’s marching today.”
“Really, in the parade?” Jeff queried.
“Well, it’ll be more like a sashay” I shot back with a grin
“Do you have sun screen?” he asked with mild alarm
“Well, I have some in my car” I started noncommittally

Truth be told, I had brought the sunscreen with every intention of using it, but now there wouldn’t be enough time for me to go to my car and make it to the start of the parade.

Continue reading Pride Parade

Some of you may remember my escapades with a piece of American culture: pancake covered sausage onna stick. I recently had a new cultural experience that I just had to share. It’s the legendary Oreo Pizza. Yes, Dominos actually makes a dessert pizza called the “Oreo Pizza”. I, of course, just had to try it:

I am sorry to report that it tastes like cardboard covered in chocolate cookies and cream. I am not exaggerating, the dough is so thin and tasteless I wondered for a moment if I had popped the box into my mouth by mistake. Bon appetite! I have more pictures of the oreo pizza here.

I loped confidently into the bar, my fancy new camera hanging jauntily from its strap around my neck.
“Where have you been?” my boss, Llanwyn asked with mild concern. He’d called me not 15 minutes earlier to make sure I didn’t miss this important occasion.
I shrugged “sorry”.
I took the moment to show off my new toy and take a few pictures. Much to my pleasure my colleagues groaned as expected. I demonstrated how beautiful the lens was, how I could zoom right in to the follicle.

Continue reading Fond Farewell

“So what will you have to drink?” the waitress asked.
“Uuuh” Kameron looked at the menu then back up at her in confusion
“I’m sure they have Dr. Pepper” I rescued him, “he’ll have a Dr. Pepper and I’ll have a Vodka & 7-Up, Grey Goose” she nodded and left.
“You see anything you like?”
“Uh, well, if I could understand anything on the menu… and it’s so expensive”
“Well, this is your night, hon, we’re celebrating”

I had decided to take Kameron out to the nicest restaurant in town: Culpeppers. They serve some very nice food along with excellent service & atmosphere. We were celebrating because, after a month that seemed to drag on forever, Kameron had finally scored a job, and a good one too. I was proud.

Continue reading Pawned

“You have a bunch of yellow jackets out on your deck.” Kameron announced with a little Southern twang. Yellow Jacket, that’s the name of a road, right? Good thing he’d already explained the term to me. Yellow Jackets are common wasps here in America, big nasty yellow & black buggers. I had noticed a few of them flying around the apartment and had summarily evicted them. Stephen said they often came to visit him when he went out for a smoke.

So, it was with a mild sense of trepidation and curiosity that I ventured out to look at the source of the insects. There were two nests: one large one tucked away to the left (pictured above) and a smaller one straight up in the middle. After taking a few photos, I carefully opened the sliding door, depositing my camera inside. I picked up the outside broom and started sweeping cigarette ash off the balcony. I’m not sure whether I expected them to be watching but it seemed the right thing to do.

Continue reading Wasps

Our faces are an important part of who we are, it’s the first thing (we hope) someone looks at when they meet us. Like it or not, it’s the image we present to the world. On a man, very few other facial accessories are as important as facial hair (or lack thereof) it changes your apparent facial structure, accentuates or covers up other features. In short, a change to facial hair can really change a lot about how we look and therefore how we are perceived.

For years now, people have been bugging me to shave my beard off. None so outspoken as my friend & colleague Lara, who, when she first met me, decided she didn’t like me because of the beard. She soon warmed to my personality though, but has since been a stalwart advocate for a “clean shaven Witherden”.

Continue reading Shawn

Today is Arthur Hall’s birthday. “Who is that?” you well may ask. Well, that’s actually a surprisingly complex question. Another question you may ask (if you know me at all) is how the heck I remembered his birthday when I forget just about everything else. These are both valid questions. I’ll deal with the second one first.

I remember his birthday because he’s born on the 8th of the 8th (August) and one of the first birthdays I celebrated with him was back in 1988. (8/8/88). It was a very popular year for Asian couples to get married since 8 is considered very lucky by some. It’s hard to believe that it was probably around 20 years ago that I met him.

Continue reading Happy Birthday Arth

Stephen & I picked Kameron (Stephen’s ex, ex, now current bf, do please try to keep up) last Sunday. So, Kameron’s currently living with me for the time being till he finds himself a job and place to stay (not necessarily in that order).

It’s all a part of my cunning plan, you see. Kameron had been planning on coming down to Dallas to live with Stephen for a while, ever since they got back together some 5 months ago. That way, when I leave, Stephen is taken care of, mostly. Add to that the free pills, free shrink and (hopefully) free money in the form of disability payments and he should be set. Sadly, Kameron lived in Jackson, Tennessee which is about 520 miles by car from where I live in Dallas. He would have to make the move, but he’d never attempted a move this big before. He desperately wanted to escape from Jackson, though, his great escape if you will.

Continue reading The great escape

As I start writing this, it’s been 365 days, 00hrs, and 3 minutes since I started my Texas timer. So, at precisely this time last year, I was waiting vainly for my luggage to fail to arrive at DFW airport and was then whisked away on the wrong side of the road to look after a cat, 6 goldfish and a turtle.

It’s common at a milestone like this to look back and reflect on all the goings on: things that have changed, things that went well, things that went badly, lessons learnt and the like.

Continue reading Anniversary

Last night I became acutely aware that this blog of mine is read by many of my family members and friends. I also became aware that most of my recent posts have had very little to do with something these people really want to know about: me.

So, I thought I would devote this afternoon to giving you all an update on my goings-on. I have sat down to write this many times, but there’s just so much to write it’s daunting. I also have this desire to start at the beginning, but the beginning is so far away that it would take till next year for me to elaborate on it all. So, here goes, stream-of-conciousness-like.

Continue reading A personal update