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It's more posts I require, Mr. Christian, and, by God, it's more posts I'll have. And no more of that poopy foolery or I'll give them a touch of the cat!

Well, I really enjoy the threads about Brazil. Those about Thailand too. And Prague. Spain and Germany, not so much. Can't really say why. Maybe not exotic enough. Many of the guys who post in the travel section have a knack for making me feel like I've actually learned something about the places they write about. But, all in all, I agree that lately things have been getting a bit thin as far a topics go. Maybe I should go pick a fight with the new conservative guy down in Politics. That would give me something to look forward to.

Couldn't agree more, Lucky. Please note it was AS and Lurker who started it (as usual). However I have to point out my own post is redeemed by its scientific, historical, literary and theological value.

You don't seem to "get it". We all are here to have fun and sometimes that involves poop and sometimes that involves very intellectual premises. Ordinarily, I would like to suppose we can support both. No one here is an inferior. In fact, I would like to think that most gay folks are superior. That does not mean they are all tops. I appreciate your efforts to bring more posters on board. I appreciate your efforts to upgrade the content of this site. But, I do not appreciate your efforts to denigrate various posters herein. They have the same acceptance that you do. All for one and one for all. Therefore let us go forward together and have fun. That is my fondest desire and I hope you can agree also. Best regards, RA1

I'm taking the boyfriennd(?) there next week. Anybody been? Fun things to do? Vineyards? Valparaiso? I wanted to go to the Atacama as well. But I was afraid of sleeping at 2500meter elevation and the sights in Chile and Bolivia are at over 4000meters.

Last night the spouse put the movie Skyfall on the TV. It's playing on Netflix, and I loved it when I saw it in the theaters. Judi Dench is in it, and I like watching her on screen as well. So it seemed natural to go see her newest movie, Philomena. She doesn't play the tough head of a spy agency, but rather a lonely mother who had to give her son away when she gave birth at the age of 14, some 50 years back. Evil, cold, cruel Catholic nuns took her in, took her baby, and then subjected her to years of slave labor to pay their costs. We don't know what those costs were, especially since the nuns sold the babies they took in to US folks needing a baby or two. Philomena has always wanted to find the son she signed away, promising never to do just that. But, as part of a prospective story, a magazine underwrites her trip to the US to find her son, accompanied by a reporter with a back story of his own. After various amusing situations, frustrating situations, and a few closed doors, they finally to learn that the son grew up to be a lawyer, indeed, chief counsel to presidents Reagan and Bush the Elder. He was also gay and died of AIDS. So, we get a double whammy here. Judi retains her faith in the Church despite the sins they exercised on her. And, like mother, like son, as our gay lawyer turned his back on his own community to support Reagan and the Republicans when they themselves tuned their backs on AIDS. Naturally, the son died of AIDS. Did he ever try to find his mother? I'll leave that as my one spoiler left unsaid. The first hour of the movie drags and only comes alive with the discovery of the son. But it does a good job of showing a mother's love for her son and the frustratingly appalling ability of a mother to keep her faith in a Catholic Church that not only abused her, but gays and people with AIDS. Is there any insult a Catholic mother won't endure to keep right with Rome?

It's THANKSGIVING [2013] in the US of A, and I extend hearty 'wishes' and 'blessings' to all here!!!

When I first started looking into a trip to Thailand, I searched the web for information and over a few days of searching I came across a web forum that has long since faded. I asked my questions and was told that Thai people don't like black people and that on and on. I received a private PM from a person from the board that told me to ignore all the crap they were telling me. He told me that I would have a great time in Thailand. I asked him about the advice that I would not be welcome because I was black, he told me that I would be treated like a celebrity because not many black Americans visit Thailand. He went on to tell me that it will be likely that I will be the only gay black American in Pattaya and Bangkok if I go during the off season and they would welcome me with open arms. I went and he was right. Sometimes I received too much attention and it made me become more timid and shy. On my first trip I was hit on by a taxi driver, was checking into a hotel the same time as a cute asian guy next to me. When I was given my room key, he looked over at me and his first and only words to me was asking me what room I was given. I told him and once I was in the room my phone was ringing.. Even when I went to gogo bars, they guys who typically sold sex would show me too much attention and whisper that they would have sex with me for free. I never took them up on their offer because I no you don't get something for nothing and I feared they were expecting an experience that I didn't have the skill to deliver. Also, they may not have been my type. I am a bottom and I tend to attract other bottoms. Now don't get me wrong, there are LOTS of HOT Top guys in Thailand, but a lot of top guys think I am a top and won't play with me unless there is a 3rd party around that can confirm to them that I am a bottom but that does not happen too often. So when I am on a forum and I see guys getting bad advice, I will send them a private message telling them what I know to be the truth and I will try to leave out my own prejudices and if there is something I don't know I will tell them I don't know.

Good gosh! I never stopped to think that my little posts might be bringing down the Board. Sincere apologies to Lucky and to any others who were similarly put off. As it turns out, December is shaping up to be a fairly busy month, so I'll be just an occasional lurker for the next little while anyway. Can't wait to check back after the holidays and see what you've done with the place!

Again: Instead of pushing and prodding, why not lead by example?

Oh, if he did that, they would not only have welts but infected welts. Best regards, RA1

Per this old chestnut from Harry Hershfield, the posts here are just horrible to read. And not nearly enough of them!

Life in NC is far from dull, at least according to all my friends who chose to live there. If it were entirely up to me, there would be far more posts featuring nude pilots and a lot more aviation oriented posts, but there are other sites for that so I am content to visit the folks here and read what they have to say. I do not have to have "excitement" or controversy in order to be happy. I can get plenty of excitement while in an aircraft. In other words, I have no need to go speeding around in a car. If I want to go fast, it will be at least 300 MPH and legally so in an aircraft. Best regards, RA1

We do share a lot of common heritage it seems. My dad was a lover of black walnuts so of course I got early exposure, mostly through ice cream. Growing up in Florida I'd never seen a tree with ripened fruit. We always visited my grandparents in Tennessee before the harvest season. So when I was in my mid twenties living in MD I discovered the trees grew wild along highways. Soon I was out harvesting bags of fallen fruit not knowing the task that lay ahead. LOL The fruiting body is spherical with a diameter about the size of the largest US silver dollar ever minted. It is leathery on the outside and has tough flesh surrounding the nut. So tough that to remove it I drove my car back and forth over the fruit to soften and tear the flesh. Once the flesh was ripped away you let the nut dry for some days. After that the only way in was a hammer or vice. Goggles recommended. Then the laborious picking of the meat out of very tight quarters in the shell which lay in bits after the hammer or vice. (Hickory nuts are equally hard to assault and pick but with less tasty nut meats.) The most surprising aspect of the episode for this novice -- the nice walnut stain that you see on wood cabinets... one source of that is those black walnut fruits. Tearing off that fruit stains your skin brown -- dark brown. The bad news, it doesn't wash off. You have to wear it off. At least I never found a solvent that worked satisfactorily. On the plus side, I used it to stain a couple book cases. They looked beautiful.

My god, that violates the laws of nature.!!

Certainly not! I for one have invested countless hours over the past 7 years 11 months in making this the kind of website I would NEVER want. Something must be working. Oz pays my invoices without question.

My fall trip to New York was the worst in years. there was so little theater that interested me that I might have well stayed home. I saw Big Fish, and cannot quarrel with its poor box office, and I saw After Midnight, which is more of a jazz show than theater. It was just okay. The best show on my list was A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder, starring the wonderful Jefferson Mays, but I took ill right before the show and had to skip it. Spring theater looks more promising. Neil Patrick Harris will star in the wonderful Hedwig and the Angry Inch. No doubt it will be the must see ticket for gays. I remember seeing it off-Broadway many moons ago and being just knocked off my seat. Ticket prices keep climbing. Standard orchestra on Broadway is now in the $150 range, and they are just not giving value for the money, or so I think.

Don't blame me, AdamSmith started it. And when I told him to stop, he just kept right on doing it. So it's all your fault, AS!

I think I'd like your mother. My family has a strong pecan history although my mother made few pecan pies. We always bought several pounds in the shell and cracked away during the season. When I was preschool my grandparents had a wild pecan in their yard. My grandfather would shell a good size box -- two or three pounds -- for us for the holidays. They were very special, shorter and narrower than the cultivated kind and a bitch to shell but they were sweeter and juicier than their bigger cousins. It was a sad year when a disease overtook the tree. I always had an affinity for pecans and pecan pie. I particularly enjoyed a piece of pie with a good beer like Schlitz when it actually was drinkable (good in that era) -- before it was sold off to the highest bidder. I was totally unaware that people consider the combination peculiar at best and much worse than that mostly. Still love the combo of sweet and bitter. Unfortunately, my physician says ixnay to both. (As you might conclude, my pigeon english sucks. One of the first things to go in the senior years. )

Some boys on that site would make me return but I find the phone numbers suspicious with some code that needs to be put in. Makes me wonder if you get the boy in the photos??