GROOVE IS IN THE SHOWER

I was at the gym the other day ...  Yet again I was minding my own business, rinsing off from another fabulous work out.  In walked this young guy.  He was mid-twenties, nice bod (if a bit squat in the build) with a big mane of shaggy hair.  Not the long hippy hair, just some raggy hipster haircut that trolls the street with a pissy face attached to it.

I'm not even going to go off on the fact that he was wearing his underwear in the shower.  My feelings toward this phenomenon are well documented.  No, this time I was taking the high road.  I was letting that issue slide.  Live and let live, I told myself.  It's not even worth it.  

That's when I noticed the ear buds sticking in his ear and the long white i-cord hanging down ... running around his back ... and traveling up ... to the Ipod Shuffle ... clipped ... into ... his hair.  Arrrrrrggggggggggg!!!!  

Why do these freakshows insist on stomping the last glimmers of goodness from my dark garden of a soul?  Oh well, so here we go.  Read on.  Game on.

So you need to wear your ipod to the shower?  Is your music that necessary, or good, for that matter?  Do you find you clean yourself better to a beat?  Do you miss those dark crevices if you don't have Black Box screaming "Ride on time?"  Does your Pert Plus perform better with the equalizer set to Rock or to Dance?  

And clipping the shuffle to your hair?  What the hell is that?  Are you protecting your investment?  If you were 6'7" that might work, but as you look to be about 4'11" I'm pretty sure your gonna get your hair wet, buddy.  How about you throw on a shower cap and just complete the look?

You need to get over yourself and take a naked shower, sans ipod, like everyone else in the world.  I can remember the day when I couldn't take a shower without a full sound system, disco ball, laser lights, a fog machine, and backup dancers.  But I talked myself off that ledge and so can you.

After my "inside voice" tirade, I went into the steam room.  The fog had dissipated and the boys were behaving themselves.  But there was that tension in the air.  The steam kicked on, and as the room clouded the usual squish, suck, slap, slap soundtrack began.  Except this time the boys were riled up and especially enthusiastic.  I was surrounded by the disembodied sounds of sex.

Maybe, I though to myself, I was a little harsh.  An ipod would be awfully nice right now.  But I have no hair.  Where would I clip my Shuffle.  My nipple?  Maybe my pubes.

WHEN BONEY MET CHACHI

You could tell by the way they walked into the steam room that this was something special, something unusual, something meant to be.

It was hard to put your finger on it.  It was hard to describe, but we all felt it.  And that’s what made it so unique and enigmatic.  For it was no one certain thing.  It was a psychic revelation that existed, not as separate parts, but as a complex interwoven combination of sights and sounds … and smells … that upon execution became its own cohesive whole: the lingering ass grab, the subtle yet erotic nipple tweak, the intimate way they held each other’s genitals as if for protection from the angry hissing steam.  Yes, I could tell that these were two very special men with very special feelings.  They were bathed in a hot foggy steam of love that transcended the piddling motivations of the masses, and it could not be contained.

I watched in amazement as they stood there, embracing, swaying slowly, and sucking face like two seniors at the prom.  They groped each other’s bodies.  They tasted flesh with the hurried frenzy of a fat man at an all-you-can-eat buffet, fifteen minutes before closing.  Their moans and sharp intakes of breath were like a symphony of seduction, and this symphony was the soundtrack to the hottest porno you have never seen.  Yes this was hot, and I made a mental note to myself to always remember this day, this time, this moment.

But I was an intruder in their intimate world.  Not wanting to disturb their reverie, I threw up quietly into my hand and tiptoed to the door.

And that, my friends, was the day that Boney met Chachi.

NO SHAVING IN SHOWER

So I was at the gym the other day, minding my own business ... 

And I'm in the showers ... showering.  I'm standing at the end of the room, at the wall with only a single shower head.  It's the one location where it's an optical impossibility to not survey the entire room in one fell swoop.  Not that I would do ever do that ... and take mental notes.  No, I was minding my own business.  Face to the wall.  Lathering.  Turning around only when necessary in my cycle of wash, lather, repeat.

As I'm making said turn, out of the corner of my eye I notice this older gentleman taking a razor from atop his soap dispenser.  "Shaving in the showers?!"  I thought to myself.  "How rude!"  

Although come to think of it, I've never really understood what's so bad about it.  So you shave in the shower at the gym.  Big woop.  People do it at home all the time.  It's just facial hair.  It's not like it's gonna clog the drain.  I mean, when you think about it, who are these gym Nazis and their signs proclaiming NO SHAVING IN SHOWER?  They might as well say HEIL HITLER!

"Atta girl," I thought to myself, with a smile.  "Buck the system."  

I continued to bathe, face to wall, modest as always.  Then out of the corner of my eye, I notice the same guy bending over in this weird hunching manner.  "What the fuck is he doing?" I thought to myself.  "This ain't no Cirque du Soleil, and the porn studio is down on 14th street."  

So I turn a bit to take more in ... and I come face to face with Ye Olde Man Shaving His Balls In Public.  

Now it's not that I haven't or don't or won't shave my balls.  It's not that I have problems with others shaving their balls.  It's just that I do not, in general, find it exactly thrilling to see a fellow queer bending himself into a pretzel, stretching his balls with a death grip, and trying not to accidentally carve out a testicle fillet.  I find it uncomfortable.  I find it embarrassing.  

For in our quest for that Big Gay Beauty, do we really need to be reminded of how ridiculous we look trying to get there?  No.  We need to shave our balls and bleach our assholes in private, behind closed doors, where no one, not even God himself can see our desperate vanity.  And that, my friends, is why there is NO SHAVING IN SHOWER!

The Tagalong

We never knew he was there, lurking in the background ... until we saw the pictures.  Who was that drunken man?