self-isolating LGBTs of SPRING 2020

My fiance and I have discovered that, when the world's ending, sometimes we're OK splitting cocktails and watching lascivious Richard Dawson-era episodes of Family Feud.

That's something I didn't know I'd appreciate in a partner, but here we are.

The quarantine definitely accelerated my new relationship to the point where I’m now calling him my partner

!!!!!!! :D :D

xp Also, you're delving into partner cocktail quality time, I saw!

There should be a new word for happiness!

You're something with a French provincial office or a book full of clippings.

Wow DJP that is so great!!!

Yeah, congrats to you!

SURVEY SAYS

Well I'm happy to hear that, Dan!

:-D

Thank you, everyone! I’m still kind of reeling with how quickly this has all gone but I’m super happy

hey congrats DJP! (also loving the cocktail recipes)

Let’s see, 2020: I got laid off from one of my jobs, but the silver lining is I was made a FT benefited employee at the one I didn’t get laid off from. Being around my husband more or less 24/7 has been nbd mostly but I am pretty thankful that we have separate spaces for working.

I am also in the worst shape physically that I’ve been in for some time and it’s honestly bumming me out. Before all this happened I was getting into a regular exercise routine and going to a boxing class that I loved 2x a week, but COVID threw all that out the window, plus my diet has mostly gone to shit too. I’m occasionally doing online workouts but it’s hard for me to feel motivated without other ppl working out nearby/an instructor guiding me. And yeah, whatever, gay man can’t go to gym and is sad about it news at 11 but it’s been kind of a drag on my overall mental health.

In the meantime I have occasional baking projects, self-guided Italian lessons, and some personal genealogical research keeping me busy on top of work. I do really, really miss non-screen-mediated sociality something fierce though. I hate not hugging my friends.

holy shit DJP has a partner and Eric is engaged, where have I BEEN!! Congrats all around!!!

I have been largely absent from ILX for a few years and I'm friends with most of y'all on fb but:

I've been dating my current boyfriend for 2 years, we met thru Scruff when I was visiting my college bestie in Boston, things have been going super well and I have been learning a lot about relationships and my ability to navigate them (in a good way!!), we visit each other abt once a month but I came to visit him in April and have just stayed here since then and our cohabitation has gone so much better than I imagined. It's weird fake-living in (or rather just outside of) Boston, I miss Philly a lot, but it's been a v necessary experience re: living with a partner (which I have never done before) and learning to let go of itty bitty bullshit (which I am not v great at), and it's given me a lot of hope for the future

I've been doing IT at a university for the past 4 years with THE WORST most cagey squirrely lazy absentee boss you can imagine who literally just doesn't do his job. I still don't know what he even does after 4 years of working there, and me and his boss just kind of quietly pick up all his slack, his boss flatly refuses to acknowledge what a shitter he is despite the entire dept of abt 60 ppl telling him fairly regularly how awful he is. Basically our office has 0 accountability, very bad ppl are allowed to flourish, expectations for acceptable performance are set so low and if ppl don't meet them, the response is to just lower expectations even more. I could go on and on and on about how awful he is but ANYWAY after years of suffering I have finally gotten a new job elsewhere at the same university, and I start on Monday, and I could not be more excited, him and his boss have been so disengaged the last 2 weeks and it's just reaffirmed what a good decision this is (the latest is that boss's boss, who's #2 in command in the dept, rescheduled our very final meeting so that he could host bingo at an office-wide zoom happy hour. they still haven't discussed any documentation or processes with me and my last day is tomorrow).

happy you've been busy and mostly happy steve! as it's summer, i was just thinking about my days out at concerts in central park and my time with you was warmly remembered. 2010 iirc?

oh my god yeah it was.... 10 years ago, like to the month. Those were such a blast.

except for the time I was a naive goober and pissed off St3phen "Big Baby" M4lkmus and it made it hard to listen to Pavement for several years but now I just think it's funny and absurd

oh i love that story.

god stevie i'm so happy to hear about your new job.

i'm waiting a few weeks to start a ft w benefits. they hired me but whoops the state needs to do budget cuts first. in the meantime i'm collecting the cares dollars and basically not doing shit every day except for what i want to do it's wonderful. also i went in too fast on a relationship last year and... this time it's smiles for miles. so pure and easy. it makes doing work on myself worth it.

donna rouge i know about the workouts. it's hard and it sucks. hehe

Loving the positive relationship news from from Eric, DJP (!!), Stevie!

We effectively moved back in with my in-laws for the duration of COVID. They’ve both suffered health troubles in the past year, and so we are here to help with groceries and whatnot. It’s...challenging, at times, and I miss my house, but the time afforded has been good for the dissertation. CESB—the Canadian student fund—has been a lifesaver; no teaching jobs in the summer (and fall?) means it only would have been a matter of time before I had to go out there and find work among the public. I do have a course (on Gay Life in the 21st Century!) lined up for the Winter semester, though.

I’ve been virtually attending an amazing weekly film series (viewing/discussion) that the Denver Public Library that has been putting on through the quarantine: watched Dial M For Murder, Play Time, Lured, House by the River, Cocteau’s Beauty and the Beast and Cleo from 5 to 7 so far, with The Hitch-hiker, Hanna Bi and 8 1/2 coming up. They’ve given me something to look forward to each week during all this, which has been most helpful.

I love dial m for murder. grace kelly is so convincing in it.

Morbz you're a rock, keep fucking shit up.

great to hear so many updates from you guys *_* it warms my heart. as for me, my x has been playing house with his new squeeze since the 'tine hit and I still haven't met him yet. it's all fine. I decided at the outset of singledom that I wasn't going to have any wallowed sappy moments and for the most part I've followed thru, but the pandemic's broken me down once or twice, admittedly. on the plus side, being on my own has completely removed me from the responsibility of answering to anyone, and I've finally built up the wherewithal to tell my wack family to fuck off after a lifetime of misery, so I'm feelin' myself just a little bit.

also it's summer on Saturday so let the best title win

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if y'all haven't sampled DJP's cocktail recipes, you're missing out. I discovered the Jasmine.

i'll stick to beer, cock, tail

if I ever drink again

hello gays.

well, things have gone back and forth here— first few months of Covid were peachy, tbh. i got a lot of practice self-isolating and being alone last year, when i had to do so because of my low immunity...

during those months, i finished two manuscripts, read a lot, finished teaching two classes online (pretty seamless move for me, if really annoying), and so on.

only in the past month have i started to go a little insane, and it's been showing and wearing on Theo and our whole dynamic. i realized yesterday that since i finished the last book i was writing, i haven't been writing much, just reading and prepping for this online poetry workshop i'm teaching...so i might just need to write in order to keep myself sane? who knows. going to spend time today doing that.

i have been cruising a lot in the grocery store and on nature walks. i've become much more of an ass man, i've noticed.

also, i've basically quit drinking.

sending all of you good feeling.

oh hey neighb!!!!

table and i are neighbors now btw!!!!!!!!!!!

oh wau

omg hi everyone

for summer thread title i wish i could nominate eric's write-up for "haven't you heard" by patrice rushen in slant dot com's 100 best dance songs of all time redux article from 3 days ago, which is a great list (and eric's writing is the highlight).

related to that, does anyone else think about going out to dance and how that's not happening for a long time and cry about it?

(then i think about how much i'd have to hear "stupid love" this summer and i'm happy again)

hey stevie! hope all's well in Boston.

good to hear from you, tabes dear

I love "Stupid Love" and I think abt dancing a lot, but specifically I think abt how much collective joy there will be the first time I go to one of my friend's gigs or to one of the cool queer techno parties

omgggggg it's going to be wild

map
I miss it so much
Like all I wanna do is call a car to the clurb and get too drunk
I miss my queers

yeah *sigh*

going to a friend's cabin this weekend and already got all the trax for the dance party

Not just because I wanna dance but because it was like a way of dealing with shit, ya know?

Mm so nicccceeeeeeeeee jealous ::///

Like am I not going to have sex all year? I wonder?

love y'all
i'm feeling v happy and powerful lately
fantasizing abt moving into an old rv
might move back to fl later this year
lately all i do apart from work is listen to techno and play animal crossing lol

table i wish we had customers like you at my lame grocery store

i wish i could be a customer at your grocery store.

i really strangely LOVED working in a grocery store, except they didn't pay enough. the work itself was satisfying and i hardly ever paid for vegetables because i was the guy who cleaned the greens and managed the stuff that was going to compost/horse feed/still good for humans, but not for sale. i also loved my co-workers. to be honest, if they paid better, we probably would have stayed in California for a few more years.

we're going camping for July 4th in a state forest that has a no fireworks rule, so that's nice.

Fireworks have been rampant in Brooklyn, people are going crazy because of pandemic… But yr plan for the fourth sounds great though :-) :-) you know, my friend Claire worked in a bagel shop on Long Island, and I was always jealous of that. I’m also here to tell you that pandemic financial and unemployment woes r real and I don’t like them. I’m also fresh off a couple of shots of whiskey after a freakkkkky day so totally recognize that I am not making much sense right now

Clouds I’m very glad to hear about your happy powerful feeling

Yeah the fireworks this year in Philly have been intense.

we’re going camping in idyllwild tomorrow, very much looking forward to getting out of the city for a spell

there’s usually a weeks-long lead up to 4th of july fireworks in LA, but it does seem a bit more pronounced this year. they’re definitely louder than usual, but they usually subside by the time we go to bed

I have no sense of it being a hot NYC summer, bcz except for one ambulance ride i've been indoors since May 8.

However, things are looking up medically, and it seems quite possible I'll be sprung from the hospital SOMEtime this month.

mazel!

glad things are lookin up Dr M!

Julius’ in NYC (the site of what I’m pretty sure was the largest gayLXor gathering to date) is in trouble - gofundme here: https://gf.me/u/ydjrdq

♥️