Jerry Timms

I’m back from a Labor Day weekend trip to New York and thought I’d share some pictures and stories. Initially I wasn’t going to go since I have a cruise coming up very soon in October, but I’m glad I did because I had a really good time. This was my second time ever to New York, and this trip was a lot more fun than the last visit!

I took the red eye flight with Philip from L.A. on Thursday night, getting into town Friday morning at around 6:30am. Rich and Justin flew direct from Phoenix and met us there. Our hotel room in Chelsea wasn’t ready for check in yet, so we had some breakfast and walked around the city a bit. I almost sort of felt hung over from the previous night of very little sleep on the plane…I maybe got about an hour. And drinking several cups of coffee didn’t really help as much as I thought it would! So once we were able to check in most of us decided to take a nap for a few hours.

Friday night we had a nice dinner at Elmo’s, and just as we were finishing up a drag queen astrologer came to our table and offered to read our palms. Still a little weak from no rest, and conjuring up our best adventurous spirit, we all agreed and held our palms out one by one. But after everyone got their brief consultation by our palm reader, who we would later fondly refer to as Miss Cleo, you could tell by our stunned silence that she was startingly accurate…at one point even arguing with Philip because he refused to admit to her that he was seeing someone. When she read mine I thought she might have been channeling my friend Jerry when she said that I am too picky about potential dates, need to break out of my comfort zone - and in true Jerry fashion, dared me to flirt with at least 2 guys over the course of the weekend. I slipped her a generous tip and we went on our way to finish up the night at Splash Bar.

Saturday we decided to do some walking around the city and check out the Staten Island Ferry. I brought my camera and took some pictures.

New York has some of the most awe inspiring views from street level.

I enjoyed admiring all of the architectural details. This is something you just don’t see very much of in Phoenix!

Philip and his snacks!

Justin and Rich (Yeah, I think they planned their coordinating shirts).

Entrance to Staten Island Ferry.

Rich, Philip and Justin on the deck of the ferry.

I have never been to New York before 9/11, but thought for a moment about what this would have looked like with the WTC.

The Statue of Liberty. It looks really small in person! The weather was gorgeous with hundreds of perfect little fluffy clouds.

Me on the deck of the ferry. It was kind of hectic on the deck with everyone frantically taking hundreds of pictures!

In the evening we met Philip’s friend Darlene at a great Tapas restaurant called The Stanton Social, where we all tried about a dozen different dishes.

Saturday evening we went to see Peter Rauhofer spin and Maya perform at an all-weekend event called “Work” at Stereo Nightclub. It was an interesting medium-sized industrial-themed club, and had a decent sized crowd. I met some really nice guys from Toronto (I took Miss Cleo’s challenge head on!) and enjoyed the dancing and music. Philip and I left at about 6am, letting Rich and Justin close out the night. Luckily Philip and I are usually on the same page when it comes to leaving, as I just don’t enjoy staying all the way until the very end when a club or event closes.

Sunday we all slept in until about noon, when we got up and started what consistently became a 3 hour process for us all to get ready. But it wasn’t really a big deal, because none of us were in a hurry to do anything. So once everyone was ready to go, we headed out for lunch and some shopping.

Sunday afternoon we walked around the Village where sights like this were pretty common. Actually I was pretty surprised to see gay people everywhere we went in NYC, as I didn’t remember it being like this when I was last here.

Sunday night, we were back at Stereo to see Offer Nissim and Suzanne Palmer. This night the club was completely packed. The energy was good, although I noticed that the crowd didn’t seem as friendly as at some of the circuit events I’ve been to. Nevertheless, I still met some nice people and enjoyed the night dancing and socializing with friends.

A view from the second floor balcony at the event on Sunday night.

Oh, and I’m totally going to have to visit Toronto soon!

I’m back in Phoenix and happy to report that I just had probably the best weekend ever…in Orlando for One Mighty Weekend and Disney Gay Days.

To be really honest, last weekend was a bit of a test. I was considering retiring from the party scene for awhile. Why? Well that was my apprehension about not having goals and whatnot. I felt a little wary about continuing along this path if it was just going to continue to be more of the same. I figured that I have learned some things and improved myself at past events, and if I continued going to parties it would just be for purely hedonistic reasons.

Well that wasn’t the case, and this past weekend really showed me that there’s no limit to how much you can learn about yourself and others when you’re in this type of environment. Plus I’m really grateful for being able to spend some more bonding time with newer friends like Philip, Bernard, Kendall, Tony and Dallas Justin.

Don’t get me wrong, there was a fair bit of hedonism as well. Several of the 9 parties last weekend were just absolutely insane, and I never knew it was possible to have that much fun!

The desire to spend time with ‘people who are like you’ is strong and necessary for every gay man and woman. And after you jump into that sea of acceptance, joy and love…you come out of it, at the same time, both less and more of the person you once were.

Coming back home from a circuit party is a harsh transition from a created Utopia to the real world, where this acceptance and love can be hard to find. We have very real enemies here…and most of you who read this allow it to continue. Luckily, we come back stronger every time with less fear and more confidence in the people that we are and can be. And even if we get only a glimpse of the glory that’s possible in life, it’s a glimpse nonetheless, and that’s something.

Well even though I’m sure you’re all anxious to see some pictures from my travels, I actually didn’t take that many. I think I must have burned myself out on taking pictures for awhile! But I did take a few here and there, so here are the best ones in no particular order…

Me on the red carpet at a Project A.L.S fundraiser event at Paramount

Shamelessly stalking celebrities at said fundraiser - or are they stalking me?

At this point I may as well just move into Mickey’s

Philip and Rich at The Abbey

Beautiful day in Santa Monica

The rolling party that took us to Medieval Times with Philip’s ad agency group

Philip and Justin inside said party

I have virtually no memory of this

I remember shouting ‘black & white’ and that’s about it - oh and lots of chicken

But it looks like we had cute hats!

With Rich, Gracie and Justin at LB Pride

Alas, I have no pictures of Tribe. Hopefully my previous dramatic prose gives you some idea how the weekend was spent. Pictures at parties hardly turn out acceptable anyway, and I’ve come to realize that the experience can’t really be appropriately captured in an image. I had a great time, and will be looking forward to the next events on my calendar…the Core on Saturday, and leaving for Orlando (One Mighty Weekend - Disney Gay Days) on Wednesday.

It was about midnight, and we were lined up outside the Queen Mary. It was cold outside at the harbor, but we were still warm from the previous event that night which abruptly ended after noise complaints from the hotel guests. The music was fantastic in the Britannia room, where blue lighting swirled and dancers in giant neon monster masks shot confetti at us from space guns. A room full of shirtless boys danced and pulsated in the spectacle that was one of the Tribe parties this weekend.

Rich, rather appropriately, remarked that straight people just don’t ever have this much fun. And if they could see what we were doing all night, they would think we were absolutely crazy. And then we heard “The party’s been moved downstairs.” So we walked down some stairs and outside the ship (figuring out along the way from some glass encased exhibits and strained intoxicated math that this ship was 73 years old) and waited for the next event.

The line outside the ship eventually started moving, and we were finally ushered rather somberly into the ship again. But this time we were directed down a few flights of stairs, along a long black hallway, and down even some more flights of stairs. Surely we were at least 50 feet under the water line at this point, and it was dead quiet and felt a bit suffocating. It smelled like old metal, damp wood and hydraulic fluid.

Then I heard the thump and knew we were getting close. Down another hallway and around a corner, and then we saw the glow of what must be our final destination. Suddenly in a lobby area glowing red from some discreet light source, we knew we had arrived. I walked through a doorway and saw the dance floor.

All I thought was wow, this really was the boiler room. 50 foot steel walls framed a very large space adorned with mangled pipes and cut steel beams. A riveted steel ceiling hung tenuously above us with various pipes and tubes that had surely served some very important purpose when this ship was in working order. Ominous red lights swooped around the room illuminating every detail for only seconds at a time, and it felt more as though we were in some natural underground cavern rather than a man made cruise ship. The “afterhours” music was thumping, and we inserted ourselves into the dance floor and started moving.

Afterhours is my favorite time to dance. The music is dark, the dance floor is dark, and everything feels very serious and sensual. This is my time for meditation and prayer. I think about everyone I’m with, who I am, where I’ve been and where I’m going. My body moves effortlessly to the rhythm of the music, and I let it take me where it takes me. All the while delighting in being reconnected once again with the energy of my tribe.

Mr. X was here tonight, looking and feeling better than ever. Looking around us, so many others were smiling and introducing themselves that we really felt at home here and had a great time dancing together and talking to everyone around us…old friends and new. The experience really is at times beyond words.

One guy in particular was dancing near us, and had the greatest smile and a wise, piercing gaze. After remarking to myself how happy and content he seemed, I noticed a Kanji tattoo on his back. After meeting him later and realizing that he was here from San Diego with our new circuit friend Grace, I patted his back and asked him what his tattoo meant.

His response? Soul revival.

Saturday afternoon was spent at the Phoenix pride festival with Mark and Andrea, Rich, Justin, Philip and Rob. What started out as a fun afternoon unfortunately turned fairly miserable for me because I had an awful athsma and allergy attack from the dust. Mental note to get on the daily allergy meds now that it’s summer.

Andrea and Rich

Mark and Philip

Justin and Rob

After the festival, I took a quick nap at home and then headed to the Icehouse to meet everyone for the Adonis Party…

…where I was greeted by this fantastic laser show. DJ Tony Moran was spinning, although there were very few people here at the time - probably about 10pm. So I wandered around for a bit, being reminded of last year, and soon ran into Mike, Nate and Brian.

We grabbed some drinks while waiting for the rest of the gang to get there, and when they did we eventually ended up on the dance floor to enjoy the music.

Brian and Rob

At midnight we were treated to a performance by the original Village People, which was actually better than I thought it would be. Although it was odd because I couldn’t help thinking I was looking at more of an historical artifact than entertainment. But they did teach us how to properly do the YMCA dance…and I found that I have been actually doing the “M” wrong, who knew?

The Village People

Me and Mike

We continued dancing until 4am, and everyone seemed to have a really good time. I was fairly deep in thought for most of the night since Pride often makes me think a little more critically about my life, my friends and relationships. The enemy of Pride is self-doubt, and so Pride becomes about so much more than just living proudly as a gay man. There are an assortment of things that can cause self-doubt, and many of us never properly confront those things to conquer them. And so this weekend is just one of many in what is shaping up to be a year of great positive change for me, and I’m truly proud of what I’ve accomplished and will continue to accomplish with the support of everyone.

Thursday I intended to get back to my workout program with Daren and Jerry, after taking a few days off after White Party to make sure my body properly recovers from the excitement of the weekend. But I decided at the last minute to take an extra day off, and instead headed out with Jerry and Daren for some drinks and adventure.

Jerry and Daren wanted to go to “The Armadillo” but I protested on account of a) that it’s a restaurant, and b) the last time I dove by the place they were advertising their “World Famous Fried Pickles.” Ha, I’m sure they’ll leave comments trying to convince me that it’s not a restaurant…but it is. The last few times they tried taking me to restaurant dive bars I have been less than pleased (yes I’m a little picky and stuck in my ways when it comes to night time drink venues), so I tried to spice things up by offering a night at Burn for the new Club Mistress event. After hearing the words “lesbian S&M” Jerry quickly agreed and we were on our way.

Upon passing Burn, we noted that there wasn’t much of a crowd yet, so we decided to go to “The Irish Bar” for a couple beers first.

Daren at Seamus McCaffrey’s pretending the stains in the ceiling aren’t there

After a couple beers and Jerry and Daren’s game of video bowling, we walked down to Burn. Burn was moderately attended for a Thursday, and after sharing some weekend stories with Angela some of the entertainment began.

See Daren, you shouldn’t have left early!

—

On Friday night, Philip and Rob got in town for pride weekend. Rob is the super nice guy that I met last weekend at the White Party, known to the rest of the gang since their trip to Montreal last year, who lives in London right now. So I went out with Rob, Philip, Rich and Justin to Burn again for drinks. We met up with Bruce and Tracy, and Mike and Nate for some casual talk, dancing and drinks.

Rob and Tracy

Mike and Nate

Rich

Justin, Travis and Philip

For the After-Burn, we went to Charlie’s for some dancing and pigging out on super nachos grande delux and carne asada burritos from the taco cart. As is typical with Charlie’s, the evening was a little awkward between confrontations with drunk queens and when I was slammed in the eye by the hat bill of a drunk mess plowing into the bathroom. Odd energy lives at Charlie’s, and I have no idea why I keep going back. Eh, live and learn.

So now it’s offiicially Pride weekend in Phoenix, and we’ll be headed out to the Adonis Party tonight at the Icehouse venue in downtown Phoenix. Interesting to note that my attendance at this party last year immediately precluded a breakup with my last boyfriend. I actually went last year by myself. So I’m glad that this year things are under different curcumstances, and I know I’ll have a good time with friends.

I’ve returned tonight from my weekend in Palm Springs, and I have to say that it really was the Spring Break that I always wished I’d had - not to mention one of the best times ever. So thanks to everyone who spent time with me and I look forward to seeing you again soon!

Like any worthwhile endeavor I took away something much greater than what was expected…lessons in friendship, love, pride and strength. If you haven’t been to the White Party then I recommend that you go the next chance you get!

This is us before we headed down to the Basic Training party on Friday night. Bernard and Tony weren’t in town yet becase of a flight delay.

Me at Basic Training, a military themed dance that was at the hotel. 3 of the weekend parties were at the hotel, which made it very convenient since we didn’t have to walk far, and because for 2 of those parties we had the option of going up to the room and coming back down for re-entry.

Standing on our balcony before going to the Saturday pool party that was starting right below our room. It was impossible for us to want to sleep in, because the whole hotel was shaking with the bass of the dance music outside. Well, that and the fact that Rich was running around the room screaming “pool party!” like a little girl who just woke up on Christmas morning!

The view from our balcony. We really enjoyed the music and gawking at the celebrities and familiar faces. It was fun to dance outside under the sun!

All of us before going to the convention center for the White Party on Saturday. Luckily the convention center was actually attached somewhat to our hotel, so we didn’t have to walk far!

View of the White Party from the VIP deck. There were some amazing shows, and it even snowed! There was a reappearance of the original Mr. X here, and I have to say that dancing with him under the lights and the snow really made this night and the rest of the weekend even better. More on this another time!

There were some really creative costumes, and these were my favorite.

One of the stage shows. None of them actually made any sense to me…like this peacock woman riding a horse with Mayans in the background, or Kelis…but they all looked really cool!

Photo of DJ Brett Henrichsen from behind the DJ tower at the White Party. Back at the hotel at the after-hours party he was somehow suddenly dancing right next to us on the dance floor, so I introduced myself to him and we chatted about his Phoenix show at Burn.

The dance floor and stage that were set up at a local park for the Sunday T-Dance. We danced outside under the canopy, and saw performances by Jody Watley and Idina Menzel. The highlight was the best fireworks show I’ve ever seen, synced to dance music.

A dancer at the Closing Party on Sunday night. We all agreed that this was our favorite party of the weekend, because the music was amazing and the lighting and laser shows were really impressive. We danced until 4am!

The quality on this video is not fantastic, but it should give you an idea of what it felt like to be in the party…

Rosabel was DJing, and I could tell that we were in for a spectacular night because there were actually 6 or 7 DJs and lighting experts in the front of the room all with their heads down busily working behind computers and turntables…by their expressions you’d think they were launching a missile. The room was really hot with all the energy, and everyone was sweating and having the time of their lives dancing to the tribal house music.

One thing that remained constant throughout the weekend was the music…and oddly we all remarked that the beat was the same wherever we went, like the BPMs had been purposefully set the same for all the shows and parties, provising a perfect continuous soundtrack for the weekend. Which really makes it interesting to note how important music and dancing is to me and my peer group lately, and the role that I think it’s playing in my life…but that’s for another day!

Since I probably won’t be blogging again for several days, I’ll end this series by saying farewell for now…I’ll be in Palm Springs this weekend experiencing the Spring Break that I always wish I’d had! I’ll take lots of pictures for you. Until then I’ll give you this glimpse of the fabulous Wyndham resort where I’ll be staying with Rich, Justin, Philip and Bernard, and the enormous parties that await us…

Likely a testament to how hard I’ve been working out lately, tonight I simply craved the thickest and rarest steak I could get my hands on. I interpreted this as a sign that my body needed protein for some serious muscle building, so I gave in and headed to Safeway where I bought a couple choice top sirloins. I threw one on the grill, but only for long enough to get it warm and juicy.

Exquisite…lemon flakes performed admirably (as they always do) as I sliced and stabbed my way to heaven. Rare, soft and juicy, and just perfect. A perfect finish to my evening of running a mile and working out in the gym.

I’ve been working out fairly regularly for about 6 weeks now. I’m starting to see some real results, and it has me excited since I think I may be in the best shape I’ve been in for a few years. That’s both physically and mentally. Funny how both efforts have been actually very closely tied together.

Working out with Jerry and Daren has been really fun…and there’s actually a lot more involved to our evenings than just the workouts. We’ll also often go out to a bar or two afterward (or hang out at Jerry’s loft), drink some beer, and hang out and bs with one another. Steve also started hanging out with us, and we always have a good time. Talk about dates, significant others, work, etc. Jerry describes this as his new fraternity, and that’s a fairly accurate description of how it feels.

Hanging out with Rich, Justin, Philip and Bernard is a very similar fraternal part of my life lately. I am impressed, and humbled, by what strong bonds exist within this circle. And deciding to do some of the party curcuit with them this year is what’s motivating me to stick with those workouts, stick to my diet, and what had motivated me last year to finally give up smoking.

I’m not quite where I want to be yet, but I know my goals are achievable and right around the corner. So, cheers to all of you that help. My shoulders are looking better, but what’s on top of them is feeling pretty good, too.

When I left the house this afternoon, everyone else was still asleep from our evening of partying. I quietly got up out of bed, got in the shower, and put some clothes on. Everyone was still asleep, so I get my things together, and headed out the door, not really sure where I was going to go.

I walked down Wilshire until I got to the federal park, then made a left into the city of Brentwood, where I found a really cute downtown area and Coffee Bean to get an iced latte (it’s hot outside!) and sit down with my thoughts. It had to happen sooner or later on this trip, I needed some extra time to bond with this city.

Thursday night I arrived at the airport (a little late - see previous post) and Rich and I headed back to Philip’s for a quick change, then down to Weho for some drinks. After a drink at the awkward Fubar, we went to Mickey’s, one of my favorite Weho bars, for some more drinks and eye candy. I’ve written about Mickey’s before…lately it’s been one of my first stops every time I come to LA. When we got back to the house, I crashed out almost right away from the long evening.

On friday we worked from Philip’s place for a few hours, then grabbed some lunch at Wahoo’s before heading to the Coffee Bean on sunset, where we ran into Perez Hilton and various other celebrities that I’m not priviliged to discuss here.

Friday evening Justin’s flight was delayed several times, and it was about 1am by the time we were able to pick him up, before heading to Mickey’s for after hours dancing where Philip, Justin and Rich all took turns turning down suitors both on and off the dance floor.

Saturday afternoon was spent getting party food at Costco, and then a clandestine trip to Weho and the mall to pick up a gift for Philip. Saturday night was Philip’s white party, where I met a lot of new people - including Philip’s brother and co-workers - and we ate white things and drank clear drinks. I also saw some familiar faces, including Roger and Jason that I met last year in Vegas.

Late saturday there was some disagreement about what to do next - and although there were several options on the table, Philip and I both decided we were tired and just going to go to sleep. I’m not sure what Rich and Justin did, since I haven’t spoken to them yet today. But when I left the house they were both so sound asleep, that I’m sure they had quite an adventure.

So that brings me back to today, where I’m sitting in a comfy leather chair in a Coffee Bean in Brentwood, doing my impression of Perez Hilton - blogging in a corner with an iced coffee drink.