Whine and Cheese

Work has been brutal of late, or at least it has felt that way because I've not taken a lot of time off. I'm not overwhelmed, but I think I'm suffering from a bit of burnout. My fuse has been short and growing shorter.

Last week, I remembered that drag queen comedic superstar Bianca Del Rio was going to be in Columbus, OH with her "It's Jester Joke" comedy show. I knew this was going to be the closest the tour was coming to my location, so I hopped online and bought a ticket. I was amazed that I managed to get a FRONT ROW ticket. I had also debated on staying the night to avoid driving home late at night, and I eventually booked a room at a nearby Marriott to the venue.

I ran into some Cincinnati and Dayton bear friends of mine outside, but none of them had seats in the front row. So I was sitting solo and the seats around me were unsold, or the ticket holders did not come. The show was WONDERFUL!

RuPaul's Drag Race Season 7 Alumna Mrs. Kasha Davis opened the show. I think she has a fantastic sense of humor and I loved hearing her sing. She saw me sitting solo and asked where my friends were. I shrugged. She told me that SHE would be my friend and she liked my beard. She asked if it tickled testicles or vaginas. I told her "testicles" and she announced me as a gay and I got a round of applause. I was in heaven.


My new friend Mrs. Kasha Davis

After the warm-up, Bianca came out and did an amazing 90 minutes. She never stops moving. I took probably two dozen or more photos and only a few had no blurs. Her humor was bawdy, irreverent, and non-PC. She explained to the masses that it was going to be that way. I can't imagine why anyone would go to Bianca's show if they didn't know her humor. I absolutely loved it and was howling with laughter many times. I can't wait to see what she does next.


Bianca Del Rio! Yes I was this close!
I made my way back to the hotel and crashed almost immediately. I did make the mistake of opening one of the apps and getting so much "fresh meat" messages. Nice guys, but I didn't have time or energy to hook up with anyone. It must be my age these days.

The next morning, I woke up, got ready, checked out, and drove down to The Book Loft, a 32-room bookstore in the German Village part of Columbus. It's co-owned by a brawny bear friend of mine and I'd not visited there in a long time. I wasn't disappointed. I spent WAY too much money there, but they have so much good stuff there. Seriously, you can wander that book store for hours upon hours and still never really see all of it.

I finally headed for home, enjoying my day off from the office and still basking in the aftermath of the comedy show. I spent a lot of money in the last two days, but the break from the work was certainly worth every penny.

A few years back, there was a "meme" of sorts going around, where users would take a photo of themselves every day for a year. Quite a number of handsome fellers did this and it was fun to watch.

On a different page, I was listening to a podcast last year that said that creative people (people who write, draw, whatever) should engage in their creativity every day, even if it's something small or quick.

Last year, I decided to combine both ideas into a meme of my own. I decided to challenge myself to draw something... anything... at least once a day, every day, for 2015. It took a lot of effort to remember to do it every day, but as of last night, I finished the last drawing for the set. You can find the whole set here on my Flickr account or click on any of the big image behind the cut.








It's been an interesting little experiment. I didn't want to skip a day if I could avoid it. So on weeks or weekends I traveled, I had to make sure to set aside a few moments to draw something. I carried a small pad of paper with me, but also drew on napkins, scratch paper, even wooden blocks when needed. One morning I did forget to intentionally draw something, but luckily, I recalled doodling on the blotter on my desk at work when on a conference call the previous day (see Day 167 - Calendar Scribbles). Some of the cartoons were elaborate, others not so much, and some were pencils, inks, and colored pages of the Bear Patrol comic.

Keeping track of the numbers seemed to cause me issues too. I've had to re-number the set twice because I skipped a number, but not a day.

The most fun of the set is looking back and seeing reflections of my mood, of life events, of different stresses that played out during the year. It's all there really. So it's been like having a second journal of sorts.

Now that 2016 is here, I'm not going to try to make it a point to do it every day, but I'm sure I'll be drawing nearly the same amount anyway. Still, I'm glad I put myself through it. It was fun and I enjoyed the outcome.