Chapter 2 Meet The Staff (Part 1)

My dad’s response on the phone when I tell him that I am now working at a gay bar: “like in the Birdcage.”
Me “I wish.”
Dad: “(exhales cigarette smoke then chokes on his own laughter) To bad, I love that Robin Williams. He’s no Eddie Murphy, but he was great in Moscow On The Hudson when he says ‘I am job!”

There are so many different kinds of people employed there. It’s an eclectic, cutthroat group that work there to say the least. Everyone is in their own realm and version of reality compared to greater society. There is something in this place that makes us all similar and therefore creates a cohesive staff, besides the fact that most of us are fudge-packing, Nancy-boy-queers and dykes. In comedy, when there are a group of gays on one show it’s called an “alternative showcase.” The question I always ask myself when I hear this is “alternative to what?” Working at this bar is similar, only we consider a “regular” hetero-normative bar the alternative showcase.

I hate the word queer almost as much as I hate the word “partner.” Queer insinuates that there is something wrong with being gay and that is simply untrue. If gay is odd or wrong to someone, then that’s their problem. For example, Michelle Bachmann’s husband is queer because he is a weirdo, not because he is gay, allagedly. Trust, the gay community doesn’t want him.
When gay people use the term “partner,” it makes me just want to punch them and say, "Hey, he's your fucking husband! Are you living as a couple who occasionally gets down or business partners who play golf? That word makes us look even more like outcasts of greater society than we are or have to be."

I hate when gays use the term partner almost as much when straight people use it. This is not their fault though. They are making an effort to treat us the way they are told we want to be treated, even though the term just alienates gay people more. "Partner" makes gay people sound like they are talking about a business venture. If you are gold-digger and marry a person old enough to remember when the Louisiana Purchase was in escrow then, you should call your “lover,” “partner,” or "investor" in Anna Nicole's case (may she rest in peace stuffing her face with fried chicken). To sleep with an old sack of skin for some of their fortune seems to be a fair deal when it comes to this kind of partnership. If you are a well-to-do hippy, who now shops at the Mac store and Whole Foods, get over the PC crap, because lets be honest, you already sold-out the second you paid your taxes and invested in that family-van.