I generally have no use for the mush-minded quackery of Dr. Freud and his disciples, but I am suddenly convinced that this steadily increasing pain from my bursitis—this stabbing at my soft tendons and joints, which since January has been shouting through my synapses at an ever-increasing volume, like some unbearable interior siren—is directly related to this edition of The Stranger, the annual "Queer Issue." It is as if my body has, with increasing urgency, been voicing its objection to this inevitable June plague, even as my conscious mind has preferred not to consider its approach. I understand that the good part of such psychosomatic afflictions is that they tend to ebb when the mental stress to which they are connected disappears. Knowing this has helped me get through the recent days; I hope next week I'll be able to lift a tumbler and play tennis again.
Until then, a few thoughts on this outrage against the laws of Moses, physics, and the State of Washington. But first, I should warn my readers that this is an issue of The Stranger that took far longer than usual for my assistant to sanitize and which even now I will page through only while wearing my leather riding gloves. On its own, the "essay" by EDMUND WHITE—who at 69 should be exhibiting a little more concern about the welfare of his bowels, never mind the judgment that awaits in his fast-approaching afterlife—is enough to cause one to immediately press the intercom button and demand a sponge bath of alcohol wipes. (And even with that precautionary measure, it's still likely to put one off matrimonial coitus for several months.)
The execrable admissions from inverts don't stop there. DAN SAVAGE brags in two languages about the disgusting things he does to his male companion and thinks we will be mollified by his claim that he makes cookies (we are not). JESSE VERNON, who is clearly a confused young man, encourages gender-bending (if not -breaking) polygamy. DOMINIC HOLDEN admits what I have long suspected: that he is spending far more time at work using his computer to arrange dates with men of ill repute than for actual journalism. And ADRIAN RYAN—well, for Mr. Ryan, who has plagued me for longer than I care to remember, I will try something new, a mode of expression taught to me recently by my daughter Ainsley, one that, I'm told, is favored by today's youth culture: Blah blah blah cave-fags blah blah group sex blah man-diaper.
After which we find ELI SANDERS admitting a fondness for sex-as-God-intended and then destroying all my (minimal) good will by encouraging unnatural acts at a local movie theater. The lone bright spot: CHRISTOPHER FRIZZELLE's tale of being lured into a basement by a Muslim man with a knife (is there any other kind?). Or, at least, this was a bright spot until I realized it would not have a happy ending. Alas, it appears that even men who run like girls can make a speedy getaway when necessary.