Dear Lovers,

If you haven’t heard, the annual Big Gay BBQ, or as I believe The Office is calling it, a “cookout,” this coming Friday.

August 29th
Illini Grove (the woods between McKinley and PAR/FAR)
5 - 9 PM

FREE FOOD! FREE FOOD! FREE FOOD!

I’ve gone two years in a row now and I must say that I have had a good time on both occasions. It’s cool for meeting new people and/or seeing old faces that you haven’t been able to see yet because you’ve been juggling weird work schedules and trying to get into new classes and trying to convince some advisor that she should see you even though you’re not in that major and she won’t because she’s cruel cruel cruel.

It’s pretty good for that.

So swing by and enjoy some free burgers, which I assume they will have because they were present at the last two. They also have served veggie burgers because for some reason gays tend to dig that shit. Probably no black bean burgers though. That shit’s expensive.

It’s a great way to start this Labor Day Weekend* and a Friday night, especially if you’re a freshman who can’t legally hit the bars up just yet and are in need of getting the hell away from your dorm.

*Labor Day …. does that really warrant capitalization? Really?

PS I had a really great photo to post here but I’ve been having trouble with uploading on here lately, so just know that it was awesome.

This is a new “section” of my blog I am creating called The Office: Followed By Some Other Title. The Office will be devoted to the goings-on of the LGBT office located on the third floor of the union. Today’s episode is devoted to explaining what the office is, and since I don’t actually work for them, it’s likely that I’ll say something incorrect. If that’s the case, I apologize.

I was in The Office (I’m telling you, capitalization is necessary) the other day with one of my best buddies. First we were discussing the film we were watching: Mulan. Mulan is a great film because it tells the story of a young Chinese woman who not only saves China from the Hun, but she does it all in drag. A fine lesson from this movie that it is totally acceptable to fall in love with a comrade of the same sex on the battlefield provided you find out he was actually a she all along. Conversation then turned to the fact that aside from the new princess movie (Frog Princess, set in New Orleans) coming out, there is only one other black character in a Disney animated movie, and that guy happened to be in Atlantis, aka a movie no one saw. Naturally conversation moved on to our whorish sex lives.

It was at this moment that a guy in a Sox tee sitting on a bench outside the office (waiting for legal services from the office next door, apparently) decided to interrupt. He wanted to know what service the office provided, or if it indeed offered any services at all. From his vantage point, all he saw were two guys sitting in front of a rainbow flag talking about finger fucking, and unless the office provided the finger fucking in question, why does it need to exist?

We tried explaining that the office serves first as a safe place, a place where queers could feel comfortable being queer. I told him about a time walking in Champaign with my boyfriend and someone shouted “fag!” and whipped a beer bottle at his head. Does this guy not read the paper? Or just not pay attention in general? Last semester a kid was on Green St. when he was attacked for being gay and ended up in the hospital. While we have a fairly liberal campus, we’re not exactly in San Francisco just yet.

Aside from that, The Office sponsors such events as the weekly coffee house at the etc. café in Urbana on Tuesday nights and the upcoming cookout in Illini Grove, that little niche of woods near CRCE. That’s happening this Friday the 29th between 5 and 9 PM, by the by.

“So basically it’s an office for socializing?”

I could see his point. Basically events like the cookout are used for meeting other people who are gay, lesbian, bi, trans, or ally. They show you that as a queer in Chambana you’re not alone. We’re crawling all over the place. Do hide your children. We will convert them. I’m not sure if I am joking or not. Random Tangent One: at one point this guy asked if I thought homosexuality was a free choice or if you are born gay. Telling him about the harassment I went through in high school, I told him I would be an idiot for choosing to be gay. I do believe this, but talking to my friend Sam the other day, he made a good point about all the benefits that comes with being a fag. It opens so many doors in terms of meeting a wide variety of people (as opposed to meeting 40 German majors and having to befriend them for that sole reason) and there is always something to talk about, whether it be the politics or the sex or whatever. And that’s another thing, being gay makes talking about sex such an easy endeavor and it’s never actually awkward. Personally, I think if you can’t talk about sex, you shouldn’t be having it. And then there are the parties. My god. Being gay fucking rocks.

When it comes to thinking of it as an office just for socializing, I can’t help but compare it to a frat, we just don’t have our own house (yet). It’s a bunch of people coming together for a common reason, and instead of paying thousands of dollars to know a few broskies and brostophers, you pay nothing and get free access to a printer.

The Office is indeed a place where you can go to just chill. You can watch some TV (complete with the Logo channel, for those of you who are so inclined) or eat lunch in a place more comfortable than next to a bowling alley in a basement. You can study there and have extremely random conversations with people you’ve never met before. You can check out books from The Office’s library that deal with everything from the joys of gay sex to coming out to being transgender.

The Office sponsors stuff, it’s a cool place to hang out, and I’m sure they’re somehow affiliated with all the gay RSOs on campus. I don’t know if they have any control over them or if they sponsor them or anything like that, but they do know who they are. Last year I was part of a fundraiser where we acted out a short play about gay relationships and rehearsal took place, get this, in The Office.

I want to continue telling you about my fight with this Sox fan. He told me about how he doesn’t have a problem with gays but he thinks that the act of sex itself is weird. Ok, while maybe I understand where he is coming from (good sex is apparently completely foreign to this man), what exactly was his tactic? He does realize that I’m gay, right? And that he just insulted not only me but also all of my friends who are gay and The Office itself. Did this man lack social skills? I didn’t say that I don’t mind Asians (oh, note: the guy was Asian American) but I find their eyes weird or anything like that. I don’t tell Louis that I don’t mind black people but that his gigantic cock freaks me out.

I’m glad The Office exists. I think that after our conversation was through this guy actually may have learned something, and maybe 30 years down the line he’ll actually realize that what he said to Louis and me was completely insulting. I know The Office is probably tucked away where it is so that people don’t just wander in and start insulting everyone, but I found this conversation to be a rather good one. It’s great that The Office is able to serve as a safe space, but we need to put ourselves out there in front of people and be seen if these conversations are going to take place. We need a fucking house.

I wrote the following blog a few days ago, back when the Olympics were still hot. I was considering not posting it because it shows just how shallow of a person I actually am. But, in the spirit of Darwinism, I am going to post it. Maybe it’s wrong to constantly dote on how good you look or how athletically inclined you are, but there’s a reason we do it. Why shouldn’t we want to be with really hot athletic intelligent talented people? It’s one of the reasons I was so glad I got into U of I. Hooray! No ISU, bitches! It’s also why I shed a single tear (that later turned into a gumdrop) when I was turned down for Columbia. Those bastards just didn’t appreciate the fact that I did little to nothing to actually change the world when I was 16. Fascists.

* * *

I was really excited for the Olympics this year. I figured after really getting into the Euro Cup (Deutschland!!!!) I could easily transition into some fine competition among the world’s greatest athletes. Then, after listening to some of my friends talk about their favorite athletes (okay, basically whenever I heard them talking about Phelps), I realized that it would be impossible for me to get into the Olympics, at least right now while I am in a phase of not going to the gym because my damn workout buddy is camping and to go to the gym alone would be asking way too much of myself.

I’m jealous of Michael Phelps. This kid from Baltimore who goes to U of Michigan holds 16 Olympic medals, only 2 of which are not gold. When I hear people discussing his wins, they’re not only interested in the fact that he’s an amazing athlete and more than likely a genetic mutant, but the conversation ultimately turns to how much they want Phelps to stick it in them. This isn’t just on our campus, but across the entire world. This guy could walk into any bar, whether it be Legends, KAMS, or even a Barnes & Noble, and people will flock to him, male, female, and otherwise, wanting his business deep inside them.

It’s highly unlikely that Phelps will choose to sleep with any of them. He doesn’t know them and he probably won’t accept their friend request on Facebook. Something tells me he’s not that into poke wars.

This morning I tried watching this biking event, I think it was sprints, where they have two guys slowly riding bicycles on a track with banked curves. Once they make a complete round, the buzzer goes off and they start racing the shit out of each other. My favorite match was between some dude from France and this guy from the Netherlands in his little orange jumpsuit. These suits cut down wind resistance as much as possible and also make the athletes’ bodies look amazing.

I’m a history and German literature major at the U of I. I try to work out as often as possible, and I try to be as decent of a human being as necessary, but there’s no way I’m ever going to be as physically fit as any of these athletes. And have you noticed how many of our American athletes go to Ivy League schools? So not only are these kids incredibly athletically talented and winning medals for the U.S., but they’re also incredibly intelligent/set for life.

I work at a café and I am a writer struggling to crack out a few chapters in my novel that conveniently stares at me from the desktop. How can I, or any of us, really compete? It seems that everyone in both the gay and straight communities wants to have their ideal humanoid as a partner, and thanks to the Olympics the current ideal is that of a man who is 6’4” and has an arm span of 6’7”. Apparently the man is double-jointed everywhere, a term that I had thought I had learned to be total bullshit. But no, he’s a genetic wonder who trained incredibly hard and is arguably one of the sexiest men in America.

I’m not saying people will continue to desire only the utmost perfection in terms of a mate, but I just think it’s absolute bull when women complain about having to fit specific societal images and looking pretty all the time. The same clearly goes for men. And it is completely possible to look like Michael Phelps or Angelina Jolie or whomever, but most of us just aren’t willing to put in the effort all the time. Maybe we need the genetics and luck and talent to bring us to next step, that of being world-renowned etc. etc., but we can still look hot.

Michael Phelps, as well as the rest of Team USA, are definitely hard-working beasts. They are constantly training and improving upon themselves. I work at a café and I chill on the quad throwing a disc around with my friends. I do not have the body of Michael Phelps, I do not have the success of Michael Phelps, and I do not have the worldwide recognition of my last name like Michael Phelps. I’m pretty okay with working at a café and chilling on the quad, but I’m definitely jealous of this man, and I’m definitely going to be hitting up CRCE as soon as I get back to campus.

It’s great if you feel you don’t have to conform to society’s representation of what it means to be hot and attractive, but something tells me that you’re trying to be the best at something. Maybe you’re not trying to be an athlete, but perhaps you’re trying to become some great chemist or artist or paleontologist or actress or historian or whatever the case may be. I love living in a capitalist nation where competition rules and being the best gets you a bigger house and boat than the next guy, but sometimes I just get worried that I’ll never get that damn boat.

Whatever. I’m in college, I have two years left before I’m unemployed, and I have a shit ton of solo cups that will guarantee that I’ll have fun without having flippers for feet.

Yeah. I’m okay with that. At least for the next few minutes.

This is what we’re supposed to look like? Well, I’m screwed.

A few days ago I changed my name on Facebook from Liam Reed to William Reed. By some it was considered a bold move. I was willing to give up my “original and creative” name for the common good, the common good being that the world simply needs more Williams. We’re a dying breed, you see. I actually received a letter from the World Organization of Williams (WOW) telling me that if I didn’t revert back to my birth name, all privileges that come with being a William would be revoked, up to and including the one where we receive a free spot of tea at any cafe in the world at 2 PM on Thursdays. I bet you didn’t know that about us, huh?

The reason I reverted back to William is because I was applying for jobs and I always write William right there at the top. My bank accounts are all in William and you’d be surprised at how often banks get confused when they see a name other than William on the paycheck, names such as Bill, Billy, Liam, LiLi, Will, Wilsophene, Wilhelm, and Theo. It confuses them. It makes them angry.

At one place where I work, I go by Will. At the other, I go by Liam. For professors, instead of making a big deal when they first call roll at the beginning of class and stating, “Actually, it’s Liam,” I just let it roll with William. When you say Liam out loud, a great deal of people either hear “Leo” or ask you to spell out Liam because they have never heard a name quite as exotic as that one.

Liam is a very Gaelic name. I first remember hearing this name when I was probably around 8 or 9 years old. I was with my family at an Irish festival celebrating my heritage, throwing back pints of Guinness and getting drunk off me arse with me lads. It was quite raucous. And that’s when my dad came up to me with this golden keychain he had bought for me. It was a golden medallion and at the top, in green lettering, the name William was printed. In the center was an emerald shamrock, and right below that, the Gaelic counterpart to William, Liam.

For the duration of the festival, I was Liam. I was very proud of this name because I liked it a helluva lot more than Billy, which is the name people actually decided to call me. There was a very defiant move in the 6th grade when I told everyone to call me Bill, which at the time I thought was a much more grownup name than Billy. While this may be true, whenever I hear the name Bill now, I think of an old man with a beer belly in a wife beater and pit stains getting drunk off Natty Light.

Throughout the following years my dad would refer to me as one of several names. If we were at the house and he needed something, it was Billy. If he was proud of me, it was William. If we were in the vicinity of anything Irish and/or international, it would be Liam. You know, I’m not sure that’s true. I just know that it came and went and it was a name that I learned to answer to.

However, he was the only one, so when it came to needing a secret identity to protect myself from old homo perverts on the internetz, I knew exactly what I had to do. In the earth realm, I was little Billy Reed, the kid with chipmunk cheeks who came home after school and watched Trading Spaces while eating a bag of popcorn by himself, but online, I was strong defiant somewhat Irish Liam, the kid who wanted to get laid more than anything. The kid who didn’t want random perverted strangers knowing his actual name and waiting for him outside of his high school, prime for the raping.

I had never met someone I knew only through the internet until my sophomore year of high school. His name was Tom. I thought he was badass because before I ever met him I saw him on ABC7 News when they interviewed him for creating a Gay/Straight Alliance at his high school. We had been talking for a while and I had thought he was hella cute (yes, hella) and I felt comfortable letting him know which high school I attended so he could come see me perform in my school’s fine rendition of School House Rock Live! The exclamation point is part of the title. Please don’t assume any amount of exclamation. I mean it’s a fun show, but it ain’t that fun.

Tom knew me only as Liam. I had been Liam for months and here he was with a friend of his seeing my show. After the show we went to a Baker’s Square and he introduced me to said friend as Liam. It was then that I realized I would have to roll with this Liam thing much more permanently than a simple alias.

Fun fact: it was at this Baker’s Square meeting that I had found out my recent ex, the one I lost my virginity to, my flower, my rose petal, the boy who told me I too was his first, well, it turned out he was in porn. I mean, it happens, I guess, but it kinda pissed me off.

I’m not bitter.

Moving on, Tom and I actually became really good friends. He was two years older than me so when he left to go to school at DePaul I was introduced to the whole college scene. I learned a lot from Tom about gay people. I learned that a lot of college gay groups actually kind of creep me the hell out and that gay people like to cling to each other. It’s understandable I guess, especially when it comes to the party scene. I love my straight friends, I would even venture to have a 3-way with a good few of them, but that’s exactly the thing, when it comes to going out and partying, I like knowing that I could end up getting laid, and by laid I simply mean getting a little liquid courage in me and making out with some random guy I met. That’s hard to come by at Frat parties.

Ok, well that’s a lie, but there’s a lot less shunning at parties that have predominantly gay guests. Gay parties, I have noticed, happen to be a lot more open with sexuality. One moment I’ll be making out with Alexis, the next some dude, and then the next moment Alexis is running around with her top off. And there’s no judgment, which is nice. When I see her tits I may run away out of shock and fright, but it’s not meant negatively. Honest.

Enough of these tangents! Through Tom, I was introduced to many people, usually gay, and I was always introduced as Liam. A few of these people I ended up becoming good friends with, so a name change back to Billy was clearly too late. My personality actually grew with the name Liam and I began to feel I no longer resembled a Bill, but rather a Liam. Name is very important.

With professors, I’m William. It’s a very intelligent-sounding name. With my boys, I’m Liam, it fits my non-academic sex-obsessed happy personality. At the retail store in Champaign, I’m Will, which sounds a lot more frat-ish than Liam but is still a comfortable not incredibly academic name. I use Guillermo when I pretend I’m Puerto Rican, which happens at least once a month. I’m just light-skinned!

I like having several names. It’s not that I’m lying or trying to convey multiple personalities, it’s that each name highlights either certain personality traits or certain moments in my own history. If someone refers to me as Bill, it’s easy to assume that they’ve known me for quite a few years. If they call me Liam, they’re probably a fag. And if they call me Buttons, well …. well that’s when it gets into my very dirty past, and we’re not going to touch on that one.

….

P.S.

I promise to start writing about people other than myself soon. A friend of mine recently got a piercing on his dick, so look forward to that, amigo.

The end of the summer is drawing near. A week from now I’ll be moved back in and working my two jobs at a café and a retail store in the area. I only tell you this because as of late my stalker-to-job ratio has been relatively low, so I welcome all new applicants interested in the job. It requires some hard work and constant “Missed Connection” postings on Craigslist, so please be very hard-working if you consider applying.

All stalkers aside, this past weekend I was in Champaign and/or Urbana having a gay old time (no pun intended. Huzza!) with my buddies who I hadn’t seen in months. There was a lot of Frisbee on the quad, dancing, drinking, gay drama, music, batting cages, and miniature golf. It was a shit ton of fun.

And now I am back in Chicagoland, which of course means the south suburbs and not Chicago at all. And, being in the suburbs during the final week of summer, it’s important to do what south suburban kids do best: drink alcohol and have a bonfire.

This is the last summer that I am going to be in the suburbs. Next year is momentous in that I’ll actually be sticking around on campus. This means that all the friends who I normally hang out with over the summer, not only those high school chums but the friends who stayed and studied in Chicago, will be seen quite a bit less than ever before.

I’m actually quite impressed with how well my circle of suburban friends have stayed in touch to this point. In my group, we have had people leave for New York City, Indiana, Iraq, Germany, random parts of Illinois south of I80, Michigan, and so on and so forth. There has been war, there has been pregnancy, there have even been cases of friends majoring in theater. Yet each year we seem to have been able to maintain that contact and over the summer have plenty of bonfires. There have been occasions where my dogs got into the watermelon; there have been others where the s’mores simply got out of control and ended up stuffed in our faces for some very unflattering photos. Some of us work during the summer (okay, everyone but me works during the summer) yet everyone somehow makes time to make it to the fire and just chill for a while.

What I think I like the most about friendships is that while we have all done some pretty stupid shit, there’s a complete lack of actual judgment. Sure, we may tell each other, “You’re a complete fucktard,” but it’s a very non-judgmental fucktard. Our fucktard, if you will.

When I first started writing today I was thinking about writing about gay drama. About how for the most part gays weren’t out of the closet in high school and they therefore need to bring high school drama to the college level. I was going to write about specific instances of drama within my group, but I decided against it because I’m just not in the mood to write about something so negative. I want to end the summer on a good note, ya know?

Last night was more than likely the last bonfire I will be having at my parents’ house in the suburbs for a very long time. They had become a staple to our summers and now none of us will be coming back. There’s no drama at our fires and I really dig that. It’s peaceful, almost. Sad, but peaceful. Kind of like death I guess.

Next semester is going to be full of drama and backstabbing and people talking behind other people’s backs. In its own way, it’s kind of awesome. It’s very Harry Potter in that with each new year, more and more shit goes down, and more than likely someone will get impaled on a wand (in more ways that one, you kinky reader you). This next semester is going to be intense. Friendships will become tighter, classes will get harder, and adding a work schedule or extracurricular schedule will make everything extremely busy and will fly by very quickly.

But, like I said, in the meantime, I’m pretty down with the bonfires. It’s the end of the summer and the end of an era (that being the get drunk and play with burning logs era), but hopefully some of those friendships will stay cemented. If not, I guess we have photos for a reason.

Fin?

I recently read an article that taught me some interesting information about soy, namely that IT IS KILLING MY MANHOOD. I started drinking soy milk instead of cow/goat/horse milk about 8 months ago when I thought I was lactose intolerant. I have never been tested for lactose intolerance, but when my whey shakes with milk and yogurt started making me feel incredibly terrible in the stomach/ass department (perhaps more well known as gastrointestinal?), I decided to start monitoring my diet and realized that these terrible pains only were abound when I was drinking milk. A=B B=C A= I ain’t spending no money on seeing a doctor.

As I learned from this article, which I trust wholeheartedly, there exists such a thing as phytoestrogens, and there is a category of phytoestrogens known as isoflavones. I’m not sure what that means, but what this article tells me is that isoflavones are found in soy-based foods (tofu, soy milk, tofurkey, etc.). People in the study had their sperm count tested, and to quote RealJock.com (shut up), “The men in the highest soy intake group had 41 million fewer sperm per milliliter than men who ate no soy. A normal sperm count is 80 to 120 million sperm per milliliter—so those 41 million are a significant effect.”

41 MILLION FEWER SPERM. It’s almost good enough to be a new form of contraception.

Almost, but not quite.

NOT a proper form of contraception.

Regular amounts of soy won’t kill all your little guys, but odds are if you are a vegetarian, you are probably consuming more soy than the average bear. You are also a cold-blooded murderer and should be ashamed of yourself. Every time you are eating soy you are killing millions upon millions of little sperms. If you’re a vegetarian, you’ve probably already killed trillions. And I bet you don’t even feel bad about it. You people make me sick. I should probably call the ASPCA.

I really like this article.

“Hot testicles are sad testicles.”

It also goes on to describe how being fat covers your boys and that KILLS your spermies. Or decreases them, whatever you want to call it I guess. But like I said, this is all from an article on RealJock and, if I figured out how to use the damn html, there should be an actual link to the article above. If you can’t see this link, it’s because I’m a damn fool and the URL can be found here:

http://www.realjock.com/article/1189

For those of you who aren’t superior buff machines like myself, realjock.com is a website that is promoted toward gay men who are into sports, fitness, and nutrition, aka healthy people. Healthy gay people. “But wait,” you interject, “why oh why are you, clearly a homosexual with an agenda, interested in your sperm count?”

To tell you the truth, I’m not really sure, but realjock seems to think that it’s important for gay men to have a high sperm count, regardless of how often they are actually trying to run around impregnating people.

I want you to go pour yourself a drink. It’s time we talk about having kids, dear. I know I’m only 20 years old, but for some damn reason, whether it be the fact that I was a camp counselor for many years or because I cannot wait to cart small screaming people to baseball games, I think about having kids and raising a family. And having dogs. Dogs are an important part of the equation but we’re talking about soybeans and babies right now, not how awesome dogs are.

My awesome dogs

As someone who cannot pass a mirror without checking himself out, I really want to have a kid of my own who looks and thinks like me. I will mold him to become a very intelligent, fitness inclined, incredibly stylish Casanova that will cure cancer and solve that damn global warming thing. That being said, he will probably hate me and be more self conscious than any single person should be, feeling he can never live up to my expectations and running away from home at the young age of 8 years and 4 months. But at least he’ll look like me.

I feel that gay men that want to raise a family have a responsibility to adopt as many children as they are capable of raising, you know, to take care of all the “mistakes” heterosexual slutty 15 year old girls create. You’ve seen the hit blockbuster Juno, don’t act like you don’t know what I’m talking about. Her legs were wider than … well, like I said, we’re here to talk about soy beans and babies.

There is actually a multitude of options for gay men when it comes to having children. Think about it, if you happen to be “the hot one” of the couple, it’s not an insult when you say to your partner, “I think we should hire someone for me to artificially inseminate.” You get a pretty baby and your husband, Lenny McGee, is not insulted. Try that with your wife, “Uh yeah hon, I was wondering if you mind me inseminating, artificially or otherwise, your best friend Gina. She’s a lot hotter than you and is a doctor and I think that’s what our baby needs. We have to sacrifice ourselves, babe.”

There’s adoption, there’s artificial insemination, of course you can do it cheaper and just sleep with, egad, a woman, and then of course there’s those small women in India who you can pay to carry your child even though you’re a giant 300 lb. man and she weighs in at 95 lbs. and probably shouldn’t be carrying your baby, but needs to make 1,000 bucks to keep her family fed. And of course you can always steal a baby.

Oh. Wait. I forgot something, you CAN’T adopt. If you want to adopt a child as a gay parent, you probably need to run to a country like China to do so. That’s what my high school French teacher did, and while she loved her daughter, she still had to travel to China every now and then for paperwork. China is simply too far away, thank you very much!

I think conservatives are very interesting people. The general conservative consensus is that abortion is murder and that adoption by gays is wrong, yet with all the conservatives out there, it seems like there are a helluva lot of unadopted American children out there. Interesting. I guess the only proper way to act as a 15 year old pregnant girl is to drop out of school and raise the child by working at a Blockbuster (not that there’s anything wrong with that). Or you could just never have sex, but even Blockbuster employees have to get laid.

It’s relatively easy for a gay guy to marry his best female friend, get her all knocked up, and then get parental rights. It’s even easier for lesbians thanks to the fine mechanics of the turkey baster. So why is it that in a world of 150 million orphaned children that gays can’t adopt? It seems that if there are people out there who don’t want these babies aborted, they should be willing to give these kids the best shot at being adopted by a loving family as possible.

But what do I know, right? I’m just some guy with a sex blog who clearly has something against vegetarians.