BigBen

Let's face it: if guys were smart in these stories, the stories wouldn't last nearly as long, now would they? 🤣

A nice read, interestingly imagined and presented. I find myself somewhat puzzled by the designation as a short story, since the inconclusive ending says that this is chapter one of a larger work. A shame it's not. Ah, well!

Fred Astaire and Cary Grant were the two most debonair leading men of their generation. Their understudies were Gene Kelly and Rock Hudson, who were both classy in their own right, but more down-to-earth, ordinary-Joe types.

G & S fans will remember that Pooh-Bah was the "Lord High Everything Else" in The Mikado.

From etymonline.com: picayune (n.) 1804, "coin of small value," in early use the Spanish half-real, a coin circulating in Louisiana, Florida, and adjacent regions, worth about 6 cents, later a 5 cent piece; probably from Louisiana French picaillon "coin worth 5 cents," earlier the French name of an old copper coin of Savoy (1750), from Provençal picaioun "small copper coin," from picaio "money," a word of uncertain origin. Adjectival figurative sense of "paltry, mean" recorded from 1813.

As a note: the 'g' in whingeing is soft, so the participle is generally spelt with an 'e' after it, just as we do with "bingeing." There is a related British slang word, "minging," which rhymes with "singing" and so is written without an 'e'.

Essentially, restaurateur is French for "restorer," a restaurant being a place where people are restored or refreshed. The English word "restorator" (as in "restorer of paintings") lacks an 'n' as well. "Restauranteur" is used commonly enough in English that it will probably become standard at some point. A similar case is chaise longue 'long chair', which many English speakers read, pronounce, and spell as "chaise lounge." These days, only the most pretentious of us would dare use the original French phrase. I assume "restauranteur" isn't far behind. The French do the same with English words, turning them into biftek, redingote, and shampooing (which is not pronounced anything like the English word, lol!), so I guess we're even.

Being a contrarian, I'm not particularly a fan of Mahler's (nor a fan of Mozart's, either, for that matter). Though I have to admit he wrote some decent pieces, and this is one of them. But when I want to listen to a long-winded German, it's Bruckner who has captured my heart. In any case, this is a beautiful rendition by Maestra Norman. Divine! I'm glad you find the piece and the singing a consolation in your loss, and thank you for the link.

It was a very nice touch having the gay guy being completely clueless about what Caleb wants to talk about. It both lightens the moment for the reader, and also, in story terms, it both keeps Clark from being a stereotype and tells Caleb he's not the complete focus of the day's gossip. Very deft!

There is so much I'd love to comment on, both in the story and in the comments, but I will refrain, for fear of giving offense to the author or to my fellow readers. I seem to cause far less trouble by keeping my mouth shut.

It depends on the couple. I was recently reminded of Don Bachardy and Christopher Isherwood, who met when Bachardy was 18 and Isherwood in his fifties. They were together till Isherwood's death 33 years later. My only problem with the story is that I found Trevor to be too pushy. In Patrick's place I'd have drug in my heels, and Trevor would have gotten nowhere. But I am extremely sensitive to boundary-crossing, much more so than most people. I always have to step back and remind myself that most readers find it cute, rather than a violation.

Doesn't ring any bells for me, either, but then it doesn't really sound like my type of story. Since the search feature on GA works pretty well, I would suggest not giving up, however, and searching on whatever terms come to mind. I have found several "lost" stories on GA that way, when I eventually hit on the right search terms. And in the meantime I was led to some interesting other stories, so it was a win all round, lol! I find that the Nifty search feature works pretty well, too, but most of the other sites lack a search function and have to be searched using an Internet search. While that has helped me find stories on those sites, I notice that AwesomeDude seems to be impervious to searches, even with the correct title of the story entered as the search criterion. One other thing: the story as you describe it is reminiscent of the sort of thing that Dabeagle writes, though I don't believe that the one you are seeking is one of his. But you might wish to check out his stories here on GA, to see if you enjoy them.

I guess this explains why I suddenly had trouble accessing the site the other day.

For those who are interested, www.wmnr.org in Monroe, Connecticut, which is mostly a classical station, does jazz on Friday and Saturday evenings. The Friday jazz programming runs from 10 p.m. to midnight New York time, and the Saturday jazz shows start at 6 p.m. and run to midnight. The Friday shows are an hour of vocal music followed by an hour of mellow instrumentals (the presenter calls it "Jazz Nightcap"). The Saturday shows are half an hour of "One Great Song" from the standard playbook, followed by two and a half hours of "The Big Band Hall of Fame." That is followed at 9 p.m. by two hours of up-and-coming vocalists called "Turntable for One" with an hour of "Just Jazz," which is mostly instrumentals from the 60's onward. It's a good mix of stuff. I got started listening to these programs because my mother lived in the listening area and I was tired of the Classical 100 format of the stations I had access to at the time. Jazz has much more nuance and sophistication than the music that has been on the popular airwaves since my childhood, which is mostly dreck.

Together at last, yay!

Good point about the phone. As for music writing programs, Sibelius and Lily Pond already existed several years earlier. After checking out the exorbitant price of Sibelius, I went with a far cheaper, but equally capable program called Harmony Assistant.

I like that Brandon is smart enough to know what he doesn't know, as Helen points out. He also is free from arrogance about what he does know. I'd be very proud to claim him as my son or grandson.

So nice to see things looking up for our Brandon.

It's well worth re-reading, for sure. I'm anticipating Gabe's comeuppance, right now. 🚶‍♂️ I hate the mobile interface, it just inserted two random emojis and won't let me delete them. Please just assume I inserted an evil leer, instead.

Poor Brandon and his gaydar! This was a hilarious chapter. It still had me guffawing, and this is my third time around.

Brandon is far too humble for his own good, isn't he? I just want to hold him and tell him what a sweetie he is (get your minds out of the gutter—I'm almost old enough to be his great-grandfather, lol!). Such an engaging character.

As I commented on the prologue, I must have skipped it the first time around, because this is the first chapter I remember reading. It hooked me instantly. Brandon is such a good guy, you really want him to overcome the harshness of his circumstances and to triumph over Gabe.

I think I must have skipped this prologue the first time around. Far from piquing my interest, it would have scared me off! I got hooked by the story of the roadie and his plight, and the incipient love story. I got scared off a few chapters later, when things got ominous. But I'm glad I came back, eventually, and finished the story. It was nerve-wracking, but oh, so much fun. I'm looking forward to a re-read, though I may do a bit of skipping, just to save my poor heart muscle from too much exertion, lol!

I read a piece, now many years ago, in which a writer who had interviewed lots of people about UFO's claimed that a retired general in the U.S. Air Force told her that some of the UFO sightings were actually experimental Russian hovercraft with crews composed of short adults and children surgically altered to make them look as though they were from outer space. The motivation was that Stalin had been very impressed with how Welles's famous "War of the Worlds" broadcast had spread such widespread panic in the U.S., and he had hoped to cause further panic with these hovercraft.

It's a shame that poor Pachelbel is known only for his Canon in D, the least and least interesting of all his compositions. He wrote so many great works for the organ, but because of overexposure forty years ago, this is the only piece of his that ever gets played. Unlike a number of other composers, whose most frequently-played work is also their best, Pachelbel deserves a lot better than to be remembered for this throwaway work.