keepingfaith

Oh what a night.

Eight September

Twenty-Ten For ME!

I'll post more when I can think.

I just hope there will be some folks left at home to actually....ya know....call in and pledge. LOL

Don't worry, Jones Hall holds about 2,900 people and it's not sold out tonight. Sarofim Hall holds about 2,500 and it's not sold out either. I just checked and they are still selling orchestra seats. The Channel 8 viewing area is circa 6 million people.

Let's see ..... what to do in Houston tonight ..... what to do ...

Go see Michael Bolton at Jones Hall? .... Nah.

Go watch Adam Lambert prance around at Sarofim Hall? .... HELL no, not for free if they were giving away free turkeys at the door!

Go work for Clay Aiken at HoutonPBS (and maybe grab a quick glance at his butt)? Oh Yeah, BAYBEEE!!!

It's good to know he plans on doing this for another 50 years. Now we just calm down that he'll be "going away."

I see that Paul McCartney and Oprah will get Kennedy Center Honors this year, also Merle Haggard, Bill T. Jones and Broadway composer and lyricist Jerry Herman.

Jones, who co-founded the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company as part of an openly gay, interracial couple, says the award and White House reception will shape his worldview.

"I've always had this kind of position of feeling just outside, maybe the other, I don't know why but maybe a stepchild," Jones said. "As one gets older and you realize that your brand of art-making with its implied protest is actually something that people in positions of power respect, it's a very important change, very important change, it makes you feel more of a sense of responsibility but it's a responsibility you can accept joyfully."

The gala will be recorded for broadcast as a two-hour prime-time special on CBS. This year's will air Dec. 28.

I remember back in 2002 that Paul McCartney declined the Kennedy Center Honor, and speculation was that it had something to do with the occupant of the White House at that time. McCartney bowed out for "personal reasons." He's up for it now - and I cannot wait to see him honored!

This face. It looks like VICTORY!

I know you're all SHOCKED SHOCKED at my selection!

YES, treenuts, you know very well I'm playing with Clay.

I loved Van Johnson too. I developed a crush on him when I was teenager watching the Late Show for cute young things playing romantic roles. He was a doll in those days. I think the cat was pretty much out of the bag in the late 60's when he left his wife and ran off with one of the chorus boys in The Sound of Music. Good for him! Van himself started his career as a chorus boy.

I think I do care that Clay's gay. I think it's a good thing that we don't have to go eating our hearts over some undeserving woman who would never be good enough for him. Just knowing we would never be in the competition makes it somehow bearable, that and 30 years. Anyway, picture time:

This one has some interesting "folds" ....

And these two are Parker Daddy faces to me!

ETA: Yeah, I had to make an avie change. I couldn't help it. He's got those bad eyes like a gypsy!

Although he was slightly before my time, Montogomery Clift was very handsome movie star who happened to be gay. Most of his roles, I believe, were dramatic. Anyway MC won four Academy Awards for his performances. Times, I hope, are changing, and maybe others can see and hear what we do.

Betty White kind of outed Cary Grant on Joy Behar's show:

WHITE: Actually it was his dear friend, his beloved friend Doris Day who inadvertently outed him [Rock Hudson]. She invited him to a show she was doing up in Carmel. By then he had AIDS. So the minute he came on camera, then everybody knew. And Doris just couldn`t believe that she had been — you know, a party to that. But Rock was – was — everybody kind of knew his situation, but it didn`t seem to hold back his career.

BEHAR: No, no but –

WHITE: Cary Grant, the same thing.

And also Van Johnson had leading man roles.

I think it's a leap forward that gay actors play straight roles and straight actors play gay roles, but the next big move is for gay actors to play gay roles, openly. Modern Family has two gay characters, Mitchell and Cam -- the actor who plays Mitchell is gay and the actor who plays Cam is straight. The lines are blessedly blurring these days. The mainstream films about gay and lesbian relationships have been cast with straight actors, at least the ones I know about. I'd really like to see a gay love story on the screen, and not one that ends tragically, portrayed by actors who may or may not be gay, and nobody cares. It's the next wave in film, I hope.

Whoa! That is one gorgeous picture.

Does anyone know who took the original photo (and have a copy of it)???

In the email she said that she drew it from a photo by nyama, and wants to give her a free print.

And here it is:

I'm sorry, but that's just too much man for any man.

Holy Moses!

After a two year absence from the scene, Linda Huber has a new Clay print for sale for $20 ....GEEEEE AAHHHHH!

How about that?

Can you stand it?

Can you even handle it?

I know you want to .....

Okay, you pretty good with this, how about a close up?

Yeah, now we're all done. I mean DONE!

How about this guy for your birthday, Merrieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee??

Happy Birthday, My Buddie!

AND Alex Smith may be the starter but David Carr starts my engine IYKWIMAITYD

Y'all have David Carr now? He was cute, but I can't get over those local supermarket commercials he did here with Andy Pettitte and Roger Clemens!

liney, be happy you waited for the tote bag. The OFC store prices are far better than the concert venue (at least Hammond). The tees are $15 (opposed to $30) and the tote is $10 (opposed to $25).

I *heart* that photo of Clay in the yellow shirt. Guh.

Except that sometimes at OFC the shipping charges are as expensive as the merchandise!

shortyjill, thanks for the lovely pictures! You can always keep those coming! He's so lovely.

So, the Houston peeps are getting live in the studio? Cool. Licking is out of the question, though -- or at least I think so.

I got the HoustonPBS official pledge instructions last week. It didn't say nuthin' like that. Nowhere on the page did it prohibit licking. Don't go making up cumbersome rules now, LadyJ ....

Speaking of licking, this picture makes me want to blow it up, I mean enlarge it, yeah that, and, and, and,

eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

On Wednesday, September 8 at 8:30 P.M., American Idol’s Clay Aiken will be live in the HoustonPBS studios for the debut of Clay Aiken: Tried & True-Live featuring special guests Linda Eder and Ruben Studdard. Taped in his hometown, Raleigh, North Carolina, Aiken brings his powerful vocals to new arrangements of some of the most iconic songs ever written.

I listened to your voicemail and had to tell myself to breathe. So it's really true? A week from tonight? Clay Aiken and me I in the same building?

ETA: I meant Clay and me. Clay and me. Breathing the same conditioned air in the same relative space . Me and Clay.

Two women out for a Saturday stroll, one had a Doberman and the other a Chihuahua. As they walked down the street, the one with the Doberman said to her friend, "Let's go over to that bar for a drink."

The lady with the Chihuahua said, "We can't go in there. We've got the dogs with us."

The one with the Doberman said, "Just watch, and do as I do."

They walked over to the bar and the one with the Doberman put on a pair of dark glasses and started to walk in. The bouncer at the door said, "Sorry, lady, no pets allowed." The woman with the Doberman said, "You don't understand. This is my seeing-eye dog."

The bouncer said, "A Doberman?"

The woman said, "Yes, they're using them now. They're very good."

The bouncer said, "OK, come on in."

The lady with the Chihuahua thought that convincing him that a Chihuahua was a seeing-eye dog may be a bit more difficult, but thought, "What the heck," so she put on her dark glasses and started to walk in.

Once again the bouncer said, "Sorry, lady, no pets allowed."

The woman said, "You don't understand. This is my seeing-eye dog."

The bouncer said, "A Chihuahua?"

The woman said indignantly, "A Chihuahua? They gave me a fucking Chihuahua???"

Hey, you know that little song, Build Me Up Buttercup that this Clay Aiken guy sang? You know that group that first sang it in 1968, The Foundations, well do you remember their first hit, from 1967?

I think Clay should record THAT one. Just between me and you, the radio would play it because there is a renaissance coming on right now with British 60's hits, led by the reinvasion of The Beatles. I was never one to believe that the JBT new songs would have been radio hits ... but this one is TODAY, baby, with some scrubbing and freshening and a new lead singer. I hope Clay did some background check on Buttercup.

Why did I read that, it's a race to see who gets in the closet???

I know that people can be like that ... but not me. Our little group specifically walked away from upgrading to seats in the middle of the floor for seats in the lower elevated in Biloxi. And I saw EVERYTHING, full body view, every move. The sound/acoustics was incomparable. Floor is not always better, depending on the placement. I am definitely not a floor whore.

<------------ Yeah, and he was the one who invented the Bieber, too. I remember the night THIS picture was posted, and fans were "Oh, noooooo'ing" all over the place.

I think it's high time we accepted that Clay's hair IS what he wants it to be, what he intends it to be, and is not being "neglected" -- I think that's a ploy.

We must accept the hair.

Love the hair.

Become one with the hair.

I mean, if this is any kind of damn cult worth its salt, you guys are slipping!

I'll worry about Clay's hair the day he doesn't have any.

Best hair comment, evah.

I love his hair. Clay's hair RAWKS! I fell for him the first time with one particularly unique hairstyle - the wildcard DLTSGDOM hair, fell for him the second time with the hot AI5 hair (which is still my favorite because Clay so obviously loved himself in that hair that night), the AIW hair, the Collegno Christmas tour hair, on through West Palm Beach DCAT hair and St. Louis Christmas 2007 hair when he was so full of joy in and out and gave my personal favorite performance of DSIAFCA ever ....

Don't Save It All -- St. Louis 2007

Anyway, I was IN LOVE with the blond stage door guy, every night that we saw him. And his hair for the OMWH album was visionary. I thought he was so incredibly handsome from the hair on his head to the tips of those gorgeous shoes he wears, during every second he was on stage for Timeless. I keep watching those videos, and the 90's and 60's are my favorite decades because that's when Clay so effortlessly exposed his dancing prowess, and that he's a HOT, I mean a HAWT dancer. And, so, what hairstyle did he select for the tour that forever banishes the awkward "I can't dance" Clay image? He goes back to Idol, to that guy singing DLTSGDOM for the Wildcard competition, when he could't dance, or even move with style. He has replaced that image very successfully. The hairstyle accomplished its purpose. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Clay can never again say:

(1) He can't dance.

(2) He unattractive.

(3) He has big ears.

(4) He's not in shape.

(5) He's a nerd.

Now that he can cut that all out, he's free to commit himself to making women, and men, fall out. Laugh, swoon, smile, and fall fucking out.

ETA: And I adored Snowflake hair, too. Sorry, merrieeee!

Regarding dancing, Clay said he didn't want his mother or family members on the front row because they don't get up and dance or show enthusiasm. It all depends on the show, of course. I don't expect dancing at the Tried & True concerts, but for Jukebox type situations, I think people who don't want to dance should stay away from the floor, or be willing to stand. The standing and dancing adds a lot to the fun of a show. I say that as one who has been going to concerts since the mid-60's. I specifically remember a rock concert I attended in the 70's after an appendectomy and I knew I couldn't get up and dance and so I traded my floor seats for seats off the floor, where people are less inclined to get up and dance, so that I could see.

Although at the last Paul McCartney concert I attended a few years ago people were up dancing from the top row of the upper balcony down to the front row on the floor, until he sang Yesterday and Blackbird and songs like that and everyone sat down and rested for awhile before the "Helter Skelter" started again.

I believe that if the spirit moves, ye must dance!

I'm reading some pretty harsh comments about Clay's hair around the boards. My reaction is this ... there's a deep desire in this fandom for Clay to be recognized by the world as relevant, as the hip dude he has become, cool in his own right and on his own terms, and someone on the edge, not the edge of sanity, but the edge of "what's happening" -- and his current hairstyle is all of that. Let Clay be Clay, and let Clay do his hair like he likes --- his style may be where it's at, and we're not THERE!!!

Okay, it's Last Sunday, which is the same as Second Tuesday, or Third Monday -- it's all GREAT PICTURE DAY AT FCA!!!!! Nickikiwi posted some truly great ones at CV that haven't been retouched or filtered, and I'm having a love affair with several of them:

How about those eyelashes on the one above??? G.A.H.

Well,I guess my idea of "multiples" must be different

Hi couchie!

Saw this tweet posted by notacanuck and had to giggle...

CacaYZS‎: Clay Aiken's Tried and True has already released in Indonesia today! The DVD will be released after Lebaran :-)

http://twitpic.com/2j1iw5

Great news for Clay's CD. But what caught my eye is "the placement" of his CD in the rack. hee

It's just a visual I found rather ironic.

You mean between Bieber and Gaga? That is an interesting placement.

I can see Foreigner giving an AARP discount, but not Clay. He'd be more likely to charge extra for older women -- and get every penny.