PrivateTim

I totally get why Aaron was so hepped up to the join the fight in 1942. The world was a much more innocent place in the years before WWII. While 9-11 was horrible and fueled anger and resentment and sent a good number of young men down to their local recruiting off, it wasn't inconceivable. We knew there were Muslim extremists who wanted to kill us and harm us, we just hadn't figured they could be so successful at it. By contrast, most Americans had no idea the Japanese were mad at us and very few knew where Pearl Harbor was. The attack shocked and shook the country to its core. Steven's attitude is the more surprising one, not Aaron's. If you want to read an amazing book on Peleliu, try With the Old Breed by E.B. Sledge. Two other great books on the fighting in the Pacific are Goodbye Darkness by William Manchester and one not by a participant, One Square Mile of Hell, The Battle for Tarawa

Just finished The Box and I loved it, I think it is the best of the CAP series so far for the way it explains so many other aspects of the story. I am sorry Steven and Aaron never got the chance to have a life together. I also wish there was a way to have an alternative ending where Steven came home and built a life with Nathan only to have it dawn on him what Never Ever Grieve, Only Remember Steven meant. But even at that, If Steven had lived through the war he could never have had the life he would have wanted with Nathan or Aaron either for that matter. They would do what Nathan and so many other men who were gay in those days did; marry women they could love, have families and bury those awful yearnings as best they could or find ways to fulfill their needs as gay/bi men did for generations and still do in parts of the country. I mean, you all don't really believe those huts on frozen lakes are to catch fish in the dead of winter do you?

I wouldn't mind a story with Darius as the narrator, but probably not as part of the CAP series because CAP is about the trials and tribulations of gay, possibly bisexual, men.

But the question is, where do you draw the line between promiscuity and horniness? When does it turn to sex addiction and is unhealthy for you? What are the physical consequences and psychological consequences? Is getting laid by three guys a day horniness, promiscuous or sex addiction? Mark touched a little on the bath houses of the 1970's and the Hollywood sex parties of that era too. We have also seen the bathroom encounters in his stories too. All of them could be said to be a consequence of the times and society at that time, like when JP first found relief in the bathrooms at Princeton, because it was so hard in those days to meet other gays. You had to use code words like "friend of Dorothy" and "gay" and walk that fine line between getting some or maybe getting beaten up or possibly both. How does gay marriage play into this? In straight marriage you generally pledge to "forsake all others". We know that doesn't happen, people cheat all the time, but the cheating is generally seen as a bad thing for the marriage and often destroys them. In the blurb from the book on promiscuity, two phrases jumped out at me in regards to the CAP series that I bolded, "addiction to the sensation of

I see Rory just like this.

Live in CA. Father's family is pure Scots, even if some of them came from Scotland via Canada. Mother's family is more complicated, of her great grandparents 5 of the 8 were German/Austrian/Swiss ancestry but parts of the countries they were from are now Danish and French, so like I said it is complicated. The other three were mostly English with the earliest ancestors getting here in 1640 as indentured servants. The English part married into the German part in the 1870's in Iowa, but parts of the family (the English) still live within 30 miles of West Hartford where they settled in the 1670's. Their progeny pushed west though leaving family in NY, PA, OH, IL, MI, WI, IA & MN. A lot of them still live in those states. Similarly the German side of the family that arrived in Philadelphia in 1707 still has branches in Lancaster Co (PA Dutch) and other parts of PA & OH and one of my umpteenth cousins lives in the town where my great great great great great great great great great great grandfather who was on that ship in 1707 is buried. But they had itchy feet too and a bunch moved on to IA, NE, TX, ND, SD and just about anyplace else they could find rich farmland. A few even found their way to California during the Gold Rush days. A few stayed, but most made their fortune, promptly lost it and moved back east to go back to farming.

No trust me, I have seen it first hand how little concern or understanding there is about AIDS. As to Stanfurd, the freshman year is one of the toughest, everyone is so paranoid about failure and competition that they almost never party. The joke about Stanfurd women, not noted for their beauty, was that they were just guys who had studied their balls off.

I do love the old time traditional carols, but I am also a total sucker for the WWII songs. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXcNfA4qebQ&feature=related Especially this one. It makes me cry everytime. So many fine young men never did come for Christmas.

I don't have a huge moral problem with promiscuity, but that doesn't mean I don't have problems with it. There is the obvious disease issue. Promiscuity killed a lot of gay men in the 1980's and '90's and there are lots of nasty diseases out there still. Then I think there is potential emotional damage in promiscuity too and it might be a symptom of a psychological disorder. Here is a nice blurb about the book Psychotherapy and the Promiscuous Patient

I posted earlier today I didn't like Matt and I like him even less now. I had to speed read through 22 pages of discussion to find the spot where I am now (just finished Ch 32) and express my dislike of Matt. He reminds me of the totally selfish, self-absorbed brat Brad was. He knows Wade can't be out and he has to deal with it, it was what he agreed to. And for a guy without enough sack to be out to his parents yet, he is pretty preachy about that. If he and Wade stick together at the party like a couple, people are going to talk and figure things out. If Matt really loved Wade and not just Matt, he'd figure that out and do whatever it took to help keep the illusion that Wade is straight. It might not be the long term solution, but on Day Two (or Week One) of their relationship, it ought to be what Matt is doing to help support the person he is supposed to love. If you really love someone you don't run off and frick someone else to spite that person just because you are mad. Matt needs serious help for anger management. Part two of the equation is that Wade obviously isn't happy about who might f**k him when he goes home. Does it not occur to Mr. Insightful that maybe there is someone who has a hold over Wade, emotional or blackmail, like Brian had over Cody or Neil over Robbie? I just wanna cross check Matt's pretty face into the glass......

Wow, 51 pages.... people must feel pretty strongly about this story.... I am only halfway through and I won't read the 51 pages of comments because I am sure there are spoilers in it, but I am not wild about Matt. He has a temper issue worthy of therapy. He manipulates people into sex or coerces them and I think both of those are very bad things and he uses sex as a weapon and to mess with people and I think that is wrong too. He also uses sex as an emotional crutch and that isn't healthy. He finds out his friend Matthew has been attacked so the answer is sex with three guys in what, less than 12 hours? And he has unprotected sex in college? In 1998? Seems to me AIDS was still a major worry in '98. From a story standpoint, the people at Stanfurd are partying way beyond what actually happens at Stanfurd. When I was at Cal I'd go visit friends there and there was no partying during the week and limited partying even on Friday nights. Saturday seemed to be the only night they would cut loose a little and even then, they all managed to study some. In the story they are partying like it is San Diego State, not a highly competitive U.

No they won't stay together because Mark is just a butthead some times And yes they should just to prove that gay men actually can have fulfilling, lasting, monogamous relationships.

I am still not a Marcel fan. There is this line, "I think there's a point where it makes sense to give up on love, and I'd reached that point. I

Halfway through A Summer Love, Marcel is the one on my sh!t list now. The scene on the airplane with him amd Max really bothered me. When someone says no, you should respect that. Just because you can seduce someone into sex with you or an manipulate them into sex with you, doesn't make it right. When someone says no, stop.

Okay, so I've finished MiM and I am still not wild about Brad. I just don't get how the "love of your life" can be in a French jail and you are flirting with other guys and have sex with a woman. At points in my life I have been in situations, not quite like a BF in a French prison, but stressful enough where sex was the furthest thing from my mind. And if I had the love of my life (Brian in my case) as a BF, I would have ever needed anyone else ever. There would have been nothing that could have tempted me away from him. I also don't get Brad's lingering anger at Jake given that Jake doesn't do anything that Brad and all the men around him aren't doing, it seems the height of hypocrisy to me. Why is Jack the only faithful one (so far)? I also don't get how JP so easily moved onto the relationship with Mouse after Roger's death. When I've lost someone it takes me months to recover. We also didn't hear much about the vineyard this story, I suppose that will change in A Summer of Love. I must say though, the trial and that whole part was spectacular. I hope to be caught up by the end of the year.

Water polo is huge in California, especially along the coast usually because of the connections of the water. A lot of polo players are surfers and summer lifeguards. It is also closely tied to the elite universities, the top Division 1 polo programs are Cal, Stanford, USC, UCLA, Pepperdine, UCI, UCSB and the top D2 schools are Pomona-Pitzer, Claremont's Men's College, Occidental & Redlands so when you play polo, you know if you want to go to a top school you have to have top grades and coaches drill that into you and check you all the time. If you look at the US Men's National & Olympic team is all CA guys and 16 of 23 went to Cal, SC, Stanford or UCLA.

Malibu Sharks go down in the D6 water polo finals to Rio Mesa (Oxnard) 9-4, Corona del Mar beats Murrietta 11-10 in the D2 finals behind 5 goals from monster Chase Watson, 6'7", 250, sure to be CIF player of the year and Mater Dei takes down El Toro 11-10 in the D1 finals. Surfs up and 3 feet of snow hit Lake Tahoe, 2 feet in the LA ski resorts.

That is Boo Boo Stewart who first came to my attention in The Conrad Boys, a great gay love story. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJaBGVm29rY

Lovely, but this has more meaning to me and message that really speaks to me. I am what I am I am my own special creation. So come take a look, Give me the hook or the ovation. It's my world that I want to take a little pride in, My world, and it's not a place I have to hide in. Life's not worth a damn, 'Til you can say, "Hey world, I am what I am." I am what I am, I don't want praise, I don't want pity. I bang my own drum, Some think it's noise, I think it's pretty. And so what, if I love each feather and each spangle, Why not try to see things from a diff'rent angle? Your life is a sham 'til you can shout out loud I am what I am! I am what I am And what I am needs no excuses. I deal my own deck Sometimes the ace, sometimes the deuces. There's one life, and there's no return and no deposit; One life, so it's time to open up your closet. Life's not worth a damn 'til you can say, "Hey world, I am what I am!" This song changed my life.

You are incorrigible!

So yeah, not sure if I like Brad or not. The last couple of chapters of Be Rad he turned around a little, but the lack of respect he had for people before that and how he treated people really pissed me off. I found him spoiled, self centered, hypocritical and down right mean. I thought he was awful to Jake. Jake didn't break up Sam & JP, Sam did. Brad was so into Jake, but Brad cheated on Jake, yet got pissed off at Jake when Jake cheated on him. Brad was the same way with everyone he dated or did. Brad could get all he wanted, but if his partner did, Brad went nuts. I thought it was totally wrong that Brad discussed Roger's and Mouse's troubles with Roger's brother. It wasn't Brads place as to betray their confidences, certainly at 17 he didn't have the maturity to make an informed decision as to what the best course was. Brad also pissed me off in Paris. As if at 17, he couldn't have fought off Marc who had to be in his 40's by then. I was as horny as the next guy in high school, but I didn't get laid twice a day, or with three guys in a day, or at really inappropriate times. I also had enough self control that if I was dating someone I didn't have to do them, just because my dick got hard. So then, when Robbie has his fling with Gary, I thought Brad's reaction was incredibly hypocritical and if he is supposed to be this insightful, sharp young guy he should have recognized that the times with Gary were probably a reaction to the abuse he suffered back in Claremont. Instead of his petulant reaction, he should have gotten Robbie professional help to deal with the underlying issues that made him want to have sex like that. Lastly, when he beat up Billy the SECOND time and beat him so badly to break his nose and rupture a testicle I would have had Brad arrested and then gotten him court mandated anger management therapy. Everyone deplored how the Hayes brothers beat on Jeff, yet what Brad did to Billy was worse than anything they did to him. Okay, I'm done venting.... Brad is showing promise at the end of Be Rad, but he has a lot of growing up to do before he is back in my good graces.

I just finished Be Rad after going through CAP and the Land Whore and I am still pretty pissed off at Brad. I think he is a totally self absorbed, self centered, spoiled beeatch. Yeah maybe by Chapter 40 he had started to turn a corner, but for 39 chapters he was hypocritical, self righteous and a general pain in the ass. I liked the Stefan of CAP and 1968. I didn't like the flamey, femme him. In the first two stories he was feline, sexy, French..... then he became a typical over the top Hollywood fag. I think Jeff is my favorite character so far and Sam my least favorite. Although if I can have a minor character as a fave, then maybe Mouse, I really liked him and Greg seems pretty normal and the kind of guy that would be fun to run with and maybe because he didn't seem as slutty as the rest.

Actually, they say it was real and that Radcliffe and Watson didn't know how undressed they would be until the day before the shoot. Watson wore a strapless bra and it was painted to add to the shimmer effect, but both were nearly naked. MTV on Harry & Hermoine

I liked this song much better, but they don't hold a candle to Donald O'Connor. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1GE0qP73-o&feature=related

Okay.... the most unrealistic scene ever in a Mark Arbour story...... no, not f**king Rock Hudson, hell everyone did that.... not the great wealth and power of the families.... or getting f**ked by an admiral... no this!!