Jerry Timms

There seems to be a distinct difference in how my generation and younger generations think about and deal with HIV issues.

My earliest memory of HIV and AIDS was when I was in 6th grade and we were in the school cafeteria for a “family life” assembly about sex and health. The year was either 1986 or 1987. 1986 was the year that the term “HIV” was adopted to describe the infection, rather than AIDS (and the even earlier GRID), and I remember an article being read to us in this assembly on that very subject. We still called it AIDS, anyway, and it would be a few years before I remember anyone really started regularly using the term HIV.

During my teen years, HIV/AIDS was more or less a death sentence. It was a “crisis.” Life expectancy was perceived to be short once diagnosed, and many movies and television shows were made that portrayed the illness as involving a lot of suffering and (physical and emotional) pain. It was also portrayed as an almost exclusively gay disease, although I think the statistics even back then didn’t actually support that assertion. “AIDS” was the worst think that could possibly happen to you back then, even worse than cancer. If someone was gay, it was assumed they might have AIDS. It was my greatest fear.

Today, HIV infection is quite different. The current projected life expectancy for someone infected with HIV is about 32 additional years after infection if treatment starts before CD4 T cells fall below 350 (2006 computer model project based on 2004 treatment guidelines). That projection does not even include any future advancements in treatment or cure. HIV is a manageable infection, and those infected can more or less count on being relatively healthy except for any drug side effects - which are still common. Many patients on new treatments remain “undetectable” and can even pass common HIV tests. The key to these new survival rates is access to continuous medical care and adherence to strict medication routines - which are not even as arduous as they used to be, sometimes just one pill per day. This is of course not applicable to developing countries, where HIV infection continues to often be a quick death sentence.

So, that’s he HIV that a younger generation knows, and I think that attitude can easily be seen in a resurgence of unsafe sexual practices. Years ago, unsafe sex was not as out in the open - but it doesn’t take long these days to see the multitude of online postings and profiles soliciting it, also apparently equally from those who are negative. Something that was once shunned by the industry itself, porn that doesn’t involve condoms is also quite popular and prevalent now. I think everyone is still more or less aware of the virtual holocaust that was experienced by an older gay generation, but faith in science and medicine seems to cancel out any fear of that happening now or again.

For the first time in my life I feel like safer sex is at risk of becoming the exception for most people, rather than the rule, and it scares me.

Pick up any gay pop culture magazine such as Instinct, Advocate or Genre, and you will probably see no less than 2 or 3 ads for HIV medication that feature reasonably attractive and active models. There is usually no overt discussion of the inevitable side effects of the medication, although it’s usually hidden somewhere on the page because I think they have to disclose it somewhere in the advertising for legal reasons. A couple of messages get relayed to readers: 1. This guy looks happy and healthy (and maybe hot, although I think they are trying to tone down this aspect now in most ads), and 2. There seems to be a lot of different (and effective) medications available to someone if they get infected. These aren’t necessarily bad messages to convey, either, because they are more or less accurate. What doesn’t get conveyed, and I don’t even really think the pharmaceutical companies should be required to convey them, are the social and body image implications of those side effects, and the insurance nightmare you may have to navigate in order to get these medications for an affordable cost. They’re also not gonna tell you that you might be stuck with a job you hate, for years, because you have to hold on to your health insurance!

It all still freaks me the hell out. I am in that older generation that, no matter what advancements are made by medical science, tends to mentally equate HIV with imminent death. I am well read, normally quite rational and intelligent, but still unable to get past this mental block and see the infection for what it really is today. And regardless of it’s status as being a controllable infection, there is no way I would want to risk taking on the expense, inconvenience, stigma, and medicinal side effects of this long term health condition. Many would agree with me, but I have a strong feeling that there are quickly growing numbers who are willing to risk it. Normally you might expect me to say that those who choose to take on those risks shouldn’t be judged, but I’m not going to say that. Their decisions directly impact the physical and social environment that I am required to live in, in a substantially negative way.

(Same thing to the smokers and the obese, and anyone who consciously contributes to any health crisis - I am paying part of those medical bills, although this is about a lot more than just the money.)

HIV isn’t the only thing that freaks me out, as most of my close friends know me as the opinionated hypo who carries Listerine spray and sanitizing gel wherever I go. I really am sort of crazy about “germs”…I spray Lysol on everything, and mop with bleach. All the soaps are antibacterial, and I run to the doctor for antibiotics after every cough. People who swim in my pool think it has a lot of chlorine in it, and they’re right. What does this fear of germs do to my sex life? You’ve probably guessed by now, it ruins it.

Well, this post is now at risk for becoming a term paper, so I think I’ll close it here. These are just some of the things that have been in my mind for the last few months, and I feel a little bit better after talking about them. As always, comments and debate are welcome, these are just my feelings at the moment.

Alright, buckle in.

Last weekend I ended up reuniting with someone I first met about 10 years ago. He was one of the first guys I ever met, the first guy I ever met, and I have only occasionally seen him around town in Phoenix without much more than a passing “hi.” Things changed last weekend at one of the San Diego pride parties where we had a chance to talk, dance and get to know each other again. It was awkward when we stopped dating so long ago, because there were some mutual misunderstandings that were never properly cleared up or discussed. My first rejection. We discussed them last weekend and it really sort of filled a hole that I had in my heart, thinking all this time that he had no interest in me (when in fact the opposite was true for him, etc.). The whole thing was kind of cheesy and cute, and we made plans to go out to dinner this weekend. You know what? I love cheesy and cute, and probably always will.

Last night I was out at a downtown pub for a friend’s birthday. Honestly? I wasn’t sure if I should be there or not. It was a former Mr. X celebrating his birthday, and I was invited, so I went. I went with other friends, of course. But sitting there with a drink in my hand, looking at him, I thought crap I have no idea what I should be doing right now.

Funny thing happens to me when I start thinking about something, apparently my face kinda freezes and I space out a little. Depending on the topic I’m thinking about, I may be frowning, smirking, or smiling. The first time I remember this happening clearly, was the evening after my family moved to a new city after my 7th grade year. I was out to dinner at a steak restaurant with my parents and two of their friends who lived nearby to our new city Temecula. All I remember is hearing one of the friends say “What’s wrong Jerry?” I looked up to see him looking at me across the table. I didn’t know what he was referring to, but I was mad as hell about having to leave all of my friends, and I was busy planning out how the rest of my life was supposed to play out. I had planned out several years when this jerk interrupted me. So I looked up trying to think of how I was supposed to answer him with all this, when my Dad stepped in…”He’s thinking,” he said firmly. End of discussion. Wow, I thought, does he really understand me as well as it seems?

I was thinking, apparently, when the former Mr. X asked me if I was tired. Nobody to save me this time. You dumbass I was thinking about how freaking hot you are, sitting there in virtual candlelight, and how we somehow magically become casual friends without any debilitating sexual tension at all. We’ll be neighbors and meet for a light lunch during the week and talk about work and how high our electric bills are during the summer and blah, blah.

“Oh this candle is just burning my eyes a little,” I replied, probably minutes after the question was posed. I’m such an idiot. I tried for a moment to go back in time to invent teleportation, but it didn’t work. Instead, I switched from beer to wine.

Later, Mr. X had left, and I was just finishing my second glass of wine with the friends I had come to the pub with. “Any dating prospects?” one said. I said yeah, I’m going out with the guy I told you about how I was hanging out with in San Diego, on Sunday. I was actually a little relieved to switch my thought process over a little, to him.

“You know he’s HIV positive, right?”

No, I didn’t. Had I just been slapped in the face? I’ve seen his profile online and know that he indicates himself to be negative. We talked about this for a few minutes, and it seems that this guy used to indicate his positive status on online profiles, but doesn’t anymore. I was a little confused, and asked some more questions. My friends were simply stating the facts as they knew them, and told me that they figured I would want to know. Of course they were right, this is something I would want to know, and would probably be disappointed if I found out later that they hadn’t told me.

I really didn’t know how I was going to handle this one. Coincidentally I just had a discussion about this hypothetical situation with Jerry on the drive home from San Diego. I also had similar talks with two other friends, all last weekend. I knew how I would handle it then, but now I was feeling unprepared. I’ve never been in this situation before.

I decided to write to him and ask directly. He replied that yes, he was positive and does not disclose it in profiles, but planned on telling me during dinner and is always honest about it before anything sexual with someone. Fair enough, honest answer. I can understand a desire to keep some things private - just because you have an online profile doesn’t mean you have to tell the world everything, especially something that tends to heavily stigmatize. I replied with my honest answer, that I am not comfortable with it and, while it does not preclude friendship, I didn’t want to date. I got an accepting, but scripted response.

I felt rotten, as a million things zoomed though my head uncontrollably. I imagined myself in his situation, and it felt awful.

That’s about as much as I’ve been able to process so far, so I’ll continue later.

An assortment of photos from last weekend. I didn’t take all of these - some/most were taken by Rich. I’ve gotten into a bad habit of not taking very many pictures, thinking that others will take so many that it won’t matter. While partially true, it means that I have to steal pictures from my friends if I want something to post on my blog! So here you go. You’ll notice that there aren’t any pictures from the late night Arena and Fete Accompli parties, and that’s because the dim lighting and sweat-inducing 90+ degree temperatures at these parties make for very scary looking pictures!

Relaxing at Tony’s house on Friday

Philip, Justin, Rich and me on the Friday night Harbor Cruise

Talking to Mike at the parade. Bernard looks bored!

See? Get him a drink and he’s all better!

Philip, me, Sarah and Justin at the parade

Justin, Rich and me at the Zoo Party on Sunday

I’ve returned from San Diego Pride with my friends, and although I’m a bit exhausted today I thought I’d take some time to reflect on the weekend.

I challenged myself last weekend to start talking a little more to people I don’t know. Circuit parties are highly social events, and so I have found them to sometimes be a little intimidating. Ok, maybe really intimidating. I don’t know why I’m shy, but I just am. Now this wasn’t a new challenge, I’ve been gradually building up to this point during the course of the year, but I really gave myself an ultimatum this time that I really want to get myself over the worst part of this shyness and put that all behind me.

Luckily, it wasn’t really a challenge. I found it quite easy (both sober and not) to say hi to people, introduce myself, and make some casual conversation. Actually I’m really amazed at the number of people I met because I don’t think I’ve met that many new people in one weekend before, even at some of the larger circuit events. The primary goal of the weekend is of course to hang out with my best friends, but it was also nice to expand the social circle a bit. For once I actually remember the people from the weekend better than the music! And I think I’ve returned to Phoenix with a greater feeling of self-confidence than I’ve ever had before.

Speaking of trying new things, Jerry met me in San Diego for the closing party of the weekend, and it was a lot of fun having him there. While having drinks one night with Jerry last week, I made an offer to buy his ticket if he would come out to one of the parties with us. It turned out he had the required days off, his girlfriend was going to be out of town so he didn’t have any plans, and so he accepted. The next day I was a little afraid that he might have accepted just because we were out at the bar (aka drunk talk), but I immediately bought his ticket anyway and sent him the details of the party. It turned out he was serious about coming, and so we made plans for Sunday.

Despite initially being a little out of his element for obvious reasons, I think Jerry had a great time. He danced like a circuit boy and socialized with some of my newer friends throughout the course of the evening, hopefully getting a good taste for what these events are all about - challenging yourself, letting your guard down and meeting new people, and enjoying some great music and entertainment. It really meant a lot to me that he was willing to try out an event like this, knowing how much I enjoy them. And so whether or not he decides to do it again, at least he may understand a little bit more about what I’ve been up to, and I can tell him stories of future travels without him thinking I’m completely crazy!

So, thanks to Tony and DJ for their top notch hospitality, and thanks to new friends and best friends for spending a great weekend with me in San Diego. I couldn’t imagine life right now without you.

Last weekend I went to the Grand Canyon with my parents, whom I haven’t seen since Christmas. They came out to Phoenix on Thursday, we went to Williams on Friday, and took the Grand Canyon Railway to the Grand Canyon on Saturday. On our way back to Phoenix on Sunday we stopped at the Grand Canyon Caverns for a quick tour. We rounded out the visit with a tour of Chase Field on Monday, after which my parents left to go back to California.

Overall I’d say it was a nice visit, and was good to talk a little bit with my parents, show them some pictures of my recent travels and discuss the things I’ve been up to. I’ve never been to the Grand Canyon before, even though I’ve lived in the Phoenix area for almost 13 years, and it’s something that I’d recommend seeing once. It’s nice once in awhile to be reminded that there are things out there far older, greater, and mysterious than us. I was motivated to write a much longer post on this and related ideas when I returned from the trip, but for now I think I’ll just leave it at that.

I have to say that the more I think about the way pets are treated these days, well…it just makes me really angry. The two friendly dogs from yesterday are now staying with me, waiting for the County to come and pick them up. They are so cute!

These dogs look like they’ve been treated fairly well. They’re clean, well fed, and mild mannered. But what really irks me is that they are both not neutered, and do not have collars or tags on them. Usually I have been against neutering, because I don’t feel right about modifying an animal in ways that have unknown consequences to them mentally and physically, and doing so against their will obviously. But in this case, their owner is obviously so irresponsible that they can’t even keep their pets confined in a safe place.

If you have a pet, would you please keep a collar and tag on them at all times? And if you’re so irresponsible that your pet is going to get out of your control and have to sleep in someone’s bushes, would you please have them neutered or fixed so you don’t make the problem even worse? Better yet, would you please give your pet to someone who is mentally competent and able to take proper care of them?

I’ve been browsing pets911.com to see if there are ads for these dogs, but I couldn’t find any matches. But what was really shocking is the sheer number of lost dogs in this area…I mean there are probably hundreds just within a few mils of my zip code. How can so many people be losing their dogs?

As I was looking around the ads, I found an ad for the pit bull that I found a few weeks ago! I was excited to see this, so I called the people to make sure it was them who picked up the dog at the County. It was. His name is Cyrus. They don’t live far from here, and thanked me for calling. Apparently Cyrus was lost for 3 weeks before I had him picked up. They were a little irritated though that he was neutered before they could pick him up at County. And they had to pay about $500 to get him out, because there were some clotting complications from the neutering. And they were mad that now they can now longer breed Cyrus as they had planned.

Cyrus the pit bull (picture in his ad)

Well, thank goodness I prevented these people from breeding him, because apparently they are completely unaware of the enormous problem with pit bull overpopulation right now. Pit bulls are the most euthanized breed at the moment, because people like his apparent owners believe they’ve all got the most unique pit bull in the world and want to make a quick buck from selling pit bull puppies that will probably be chained or lost, and never neutered because of the ridiculous macho expectations inherent with the breed.

A few weeks ago, I went outside to my front yard to pick some grapes from the vines I have growing along my side fence. When I heard something rustle, I looked over to find a cute brown and white pit bull lounging around underneath one of my bushes. He had a lead chain dangling from his neck, like maybe he escaped during a walk. I don’t think he escaped from a yard, because this wasn’t really the type of chain that the multitude of irresponsible and cruel dog owners around here would use to chain a dog of this size to something in a backyard.

I went inside the house to get some water, but when I came back outside I must have scared him and he left. I didn’t see him for the rest of the day, but the next day I heard his chain dangling - and looked outside the window to find him asleep underneath the bushes again!

I called Maricopa County Animal Control, and they promptly came over to get him. Because pit bulls can be a little unpredictable (depending on how cruel or nice their owners are) I decided it was best to leave this to the County to take of. After all, it’s their job to make sure lost pets are properly taken care of. They gave me a case number, which I used for the next several days to call daily and get his status - until finally one day they told me that he had either been picked up by his owners or adopted. They could confirm that he had not been euthanized, but for some reason couldn’t tell me exactly who took him home.

So, that’s sort of an unremarkable story because I have seen many, many stray dogs and cats in my neighborhood ever since I moved here a couple years ago. However, ever since brown pit bull was picked up, I’ve been noticing a very large number of paw prints around the ground underneath my front yard landscaping.

If you click this picture to make it larger, you can see that the ground is covered in paw prints

I didn’t think much of this, thinking that maybe this was from my last vsitor. But then I started to notice that they multiplied every day.

So then today, as I’m working in the back office, I hear some rustling from the front of the house. I thought housekeeper might have been a little early, and maybe the doorbell was broken again. So I walked toward the front of the house expecting to let her in, and then out of the corner of my eye saw all this activity outside the dining room window. As I walked up to the window, I looked outside and saw another dog sitting underneath one of the bushes! This one was a tiny brown dog, cute.

But then, imagine my surprise when I look around and see a total of 4 dogs - all without collars - lounging around my yard as if they have always lived there. They were all different breeds, too. A medium-sized Rottweiler, a black Lab puppy, this little brown curious one pictured below, and a fluffy thing. Strange.

Two of the dogs that were sitting outside my window - these two were the friendliest, and I gave them water and a bone (yes, I have a backup bone in the cupboard!)

So, I called the County once again to have these picked up, half thinking that they might start to think I was the one abandoning these dogs. They haven’t showed up yet, but they should be on their way. For now, it seems, this is the lost & found.

There’s really no other way to put this: I’m ready for a party! More specifically, I’m thinking about San Diego Pride coming up next weekend, and the closing party with Rosabel. They did the closing party at the White Party in Palm Springs, and it was just absolutely amazing. I could swear that crack was coming out of those speakers.

This weekend, however, my parents are coming to town for a weekend visit and trip to the Grand Canyon. I’m really looking forward to it because I haven’t been able to spend very much time with them lately. Even during the holidays it seemed that everything was really focused around my sister and new nephew - which is expected and justified, it just feels like it’s been a really long time since any member of my family has really asked me how I’m doing or what I’ve been up to. So maybe this weekend I’ll get a chance to share some of that with them.

Actually very few people ever ask me those type of questions, and I guess that’s the whole reason for me starting this blog. If nobody is going to ask, then I will tell them - and the rest of the world, too! It’s quite satisfying, actually - for someone who has a lot to say to have this type of forum for saying it.

Which brings me to a discussion I had with Rich and Justin tonight about the unchartered social waters of blog association and disclosure. Rich has decided to include a little more description in his blog about his personal life, and not everyone is as comfortable with those details as he is - or being associated so closely with stories that they would not choose to be a part of. In the end he will decide what to do about this, and I will be interested to see how the whole thing plays out. Unchartered waters…I mean how many people used to publish their diaries and distribute the copies to thousands of people every week? This is all new.

Well apparently I’m late to discovering the Donnie Davies phenomenon, but here is the video if you haven’t seen it yet…

If you have the time to research this man (and I highly recommend that you do), your quest will lead you down a twisted path of insult, deception, and the questionable politics of Cyndi Lauper.

*tips hat*

If you’ve been following my recent spending binge, you know that I got an iPhone on Saturday. I’d love to give you a glowing review, but the sad truth is that I’m still waiting for it to be activated by the incompetent staff at AT&T.

Saturday I plugged it in to my computer, started iTunes, and was met with various warnings on the screen. Since I’m a business-sponsored customer (from my days at Intel), iTunes told me that I was not going to get a discount on my service if I use iPhone. This is sort of a stupid notion, but I had read beforehand that this would be the case, so no surprises there. It asked me to confirm a prompt waiving my discount, to which I clicked OK. It did, however, allow me to keep my old plan, which was a good thing because it had more minutes for the same price of the basic iPhone plan. Another prompt asked me to confirm that I was keeping my old plan and adding the iPhone data plan. I clicked OK.

Then I was presented with a message saying that it would take some more time to get my account activated, and that I should wait for an email from AT&T. This did not look good, so I scanned through the internet forums to see what could be wrong. A few postings had mentioned that old AT&T customers (pre-Cingular AT&T - WTF is up with that anyway?) were having problems migrating to new iPhone accounts. So I called AT&T (after waiting an ungodly amount of time) and was told that I would have to call on Monday so that the business services department could remove the discount from my old plan.

This was their process? I asked why someone else couldn’t remove it, but was not even really given a real answer. I also told the guy that iTunes presumably removed that option from my account during the “activation” process. Still no real answer to this. So fine, I thought, I will wait if that is the process.

Sunday morning I got an email from AT&T saying that they needed more information from me and I should call them to finish my activation. This was great, I thought maybe I will get this thing working during the weekend after all. So I called, and the rep told me that I needed to get the discount removed from my plan. Yes, I told her, I know and have already gone through all that. Then she told me that I couldn’t keep my old plan afterall, and would have to change to a new AT&T plan.

Now this was absolutely insane, because I simply couldn’t think of any other situation where simply changing your phone would cause you to have to make so many changes to your wireless plan. But I relented, because to be honest I really wanted the rollover minutes feature - and AT&T didn’t have that when I signed up before the Cingular purchase. I also thought this would get me activated today. So She changed my plan, but then I was told to call on monday to have the (get this) Intel sponsorship ID removed from my account. The discount was gone, but their system would not let me have an iPhone if there was this code in my account. And yes, of course there was only one person in the company who could remove it, and they do not work on weekends (even during their biggest product launch ever).

So this morning I called the business services department, and they removed the code. She told me that I should be able to plug in the phone and it will be working. So I hung up, restarted my computer and plugged it in, to be met with the same message - my account would take more time to be set up. Livid, I called AT&T support, and they told me that their “activations” are about 24-48 hours behind, and I would have to wait another day or two.

I was livid because my old phone is actually deactivated during this whol time, and I am still without cell phone. During the activation process, my old phone was deactivated, and the new phone has been in perpetual limbo. I voiced my concern over this matter, but she didn’t care…at all. I wasn’t even offered an apology…just the excuse that “too many iPhones were being activated and the systems are being overwhelmed.”

Too many iPhones are being activated? Bingo, I’d found the problem! The problem is that AT&T never took the time to understand us Apple/Mac people. We’re crazy. Put an Apple logo on a toaster, price it at $1000, and we’ll buy it with every last cent of our savings accounts. That’s why we love being Apple/Mac people, because it’s more like being in a cult than shopping for electronics. Put something new out there, and we will buy them and “activate” them in droves. Then we will talk endlessly about them and try to convert all our friends.

I read somewhere that only 2% of all iPhone buyers have had activation problems. That’s still about 10,000 of the estimated 500,000 iPhones that were sold last weekend. And you know what? I bet you that 5,000 of those people are holding and carrying their phones as if they worked! I told you, we’re crazy.

But for now I’m without wireless service. Just email me on my Macbook.