A Tale of Two Drag Shows

On Day 10 of my 30 Days of Blogging, I've run across a topic suggested by my friend Phyliss:

Sex Week on Campus

This topic presents a bit of a problem, in that I'm not sure I can write about it. Sex Week, and the last minute decision by the university to remove funding from Sex Week, has generated a fair bit of controversy, and I've been reminded in the past week that all university employees fall under the employee code of conduct, which includes some broadly vague and nebulous language about not giving the appearance of being unsupportive of the university. I am openly supportive of Sex Week, though, and am helping to facilitate the Drag Show tomorrow night.

My record with drag shows is a little mixed. I've been to some that were entertaining, but there was also that one where that drag queen threw a shoe at me from the stage, and that was kind of traumatizing, what with it being my first sober drag show and all.

Thinking about that, though, also reminds me of my very first (unsober) drag show...

The year is 2006. Barry Bonds is breaking Babe Ruth's home run record, President Bush is admitting that the CIA has secret prisons all over the world, "Smallville" is just starting to turn awful while "Superman Returns" hits the theaters and is all the way past awful and into terrible. The breakout radio hit of the summer is "S O S", by a girl named Rihanna that none of us had heard of before even though this is her second album, and I am in a terrible relationship with a guy who is not only fully closeted and will not admit that we are in a relationship or meet any of my friends who don't already know him but who is also kind of a jerk.

He does, however, have fantastic abs.

Since he later decided that he was straight, I will refrain from mentioning his name, although he may have changed his mind again since then. I don't know, because we haven't talked since shortly after I moved here, when I suddenly got tired of returning his calls. I should have known he'd turn out to be a jerk, because the first time we went to lunch (when we were still just friends) he not only made a point of mentioning that he was "mostly straight" (I still have questions about what, exactly, this means; he was unwilling to ever clarify it) but also described me as "cheerfully husky". Bitch. Even worse, since I have low self esteem, I managed to convince myself that "cheerfully husky" was actually a compliment.

This rationlization was really easy, since he had fantastic abs.

In other jerky moments, he once said that I had "a girl brain", in that my emotions were just always hysterical and out of control. Once when I was supposed to bring wine to go with dinner, and actually asked the guy at the liquor store for help, he looked at the bottle I brought and said, "Wow, this was a really good try." He used a handkerchief instead of tissues, which meant that there was perpetually a crusty snot filled cotton rag in one or more pockets. He thought my weekend habit of going to estate sales was "morbid and creepy", and he hated when I sang along to music while driving. Also, he was deeply in love with Audrey Hepburn, and kicked me out of his apartment when I fell asleep during "Roman Holiday". (It's a great movie. I was just tired.) Most egregiously jerky of all, though, is that he bought me something for Christmas that I very specifically said that I did not want. We were at the store, and he pointed it out and was like, "I'm going to buy you that for Christmas," and I was like, "I don't want that. And you know how people say that and don't mean it, like, 'Oh, I don't want a surprise birthday party' but they really do want one? I don't mean it like that. I mean that I really, honestly don't want that," and then he bought it for me anyway and presented it with, "Well, I'd already decided I was going to buy it, so you'll just grow to like it."

Like I said, jerk. But fantastic abs.

I was younger then, and easily mislead.

Anyway, because I was job searching and finishing my masters and in this horribly annoying relationship all at the same time, I was really, really moody a lot, so my friend Franco was like, "Jesus, we have to get you out. You need to socialize with gay people who actually admit to being gay, and aren't jerks. You're miserable all the time."

"But he has these really fantastic abs..."

"Shut up. We're going to the Cinco de Mayo Drag Show at Waterworks."

"Well... ok."

And so we went:



and there was drag. We saw fake Mariah Carey:



a really terrible Celine Dion, a drag king (the first one I'd ever seen), this girl who won and who didn't seem to be any specific person:



a weird snake lady with thick, heavy eyebrows:



and fake Christina Aguilera:



Not pictured: the shirtless bar boy with the fantastic abs and the rack of test tube shots. I bought so many test tube shots that I could have gone home and started my own chemistry set. At one point Franco tried to gently dissuade me from talking to him and from buying more test tube shots:

"Every time you point at him, he comes over and sells you another shot."

"But have you seen his abs? Hey, look, he's coming over here again!"

Eyeroll. Sigh so loud you can hear it over Not-Liza Minelli.

Ah, to be younger again.

But maybe to not date so many jerks.

And then that drag queen threw a shoe at me

As a gay man, there are a number of things that I'm supposed to love and somehow just don't. I'm not good at interior decorating, my knowledge of show tunes is only passable at best, I'm not a good dancer, I don't like "Sex and the City" or Barbra Streisand, and I have an irrational fear of drag queens. You know how some people are terrified of clowns, but can't really explain why other than to tell you that they're just creepy and wrong even though they fully recognize that there's actually nothing wrong with those people and that their performance requires a lot of practice and effort? That's how I feel about drag queens: baseless, irrational fear, except that now, after Monday night, I've learned that I have reason to fear drag queens.

They throw their shoes at you.

On Monday I went to the Lambda Student Union's "Flames of Knoxville" drag show, to be supportive of some of my students. I know a bunch of the Lambda members, but also had been invited by a former student and current staff member, who was doing drag for the first time and very excited about it. As this was the first drag show I have ever attended sober, I was dubious but supportive, and agreed with another friend that we should sit in the front.

Things started out ok. The emcee performed an opening number followed by an evening of bad jokes that fell mostly flat, and then we saw some really bad hairography when the girl on the left lost her wig halfway through her number:



Also, I've been waiting months to use the word "hairography" in a sentence.

There were some funny acts, and a couple of drag kings:



and then the first warning sign of danger. This girl:



did a cartwheel off the stage that almost hit Will and I right in the faces. He leaned left, I leaned right, and the feet flew by somewhere in between. Maybe the front row was a bad idea, but there was no time to move before our friend came on.

We weren't sure what name he was going to use, since his facebook poll had been non-definitive, but there he was, singing Christina Aguilera as Candy Galore:





He was great.

The drag queen after him, though, left us with questions:



Joan Jett? Juliette Lewis in "Whip It"? That chick from "Twilight"? We never got an answer, because then this happened:



That's about five seconds before the shoe came flying at me, when she decided to start stripping:



and then flung her wig, clothes, and shoes into the audience as hard as she could.



That shoe rebounded a good six feet after hitting the chair to land there on the carpet. Also, after the stripping, there were pushups:



Honey, I'm not an expert on drag or anything, but you're doing it wrong. You should ask this girl for some pointers:



She can dance, strip, and take tips with her mouth while crawling across a stage, and no one was injured. If not her, then tragic shoe-throwing drag queen could also take tips from cartwheel girl, who took the stage a second time:



or from Lady GaGa:





who carefully removed some of the stickers comprising her outfit during the performance:



Hell, he could even take pointers from Candy Galore, who not only came back for a second set:



but closed out the show with a duet:



On the other hand, tragic shoe-throwing drag queen should refrain from taking advice from this girl:



because that dress is fugly. Seriously fugly. That's like three different dresses on top of each other, and none of them go together.

And even if you listen to none of the other drag queens, tragic shoe-thrower, you should listen to me. Next time you decide that you should perform your second set in a bikini top and a wrap, at least put in enough effort to shave your stomach and chest:



You look like one of the "Real Housewives of New Jersey".

And also, please stop throwing your shoes at people.