Charlie

I wonder if someone found the photo, saw a note on it that said "Wellesley House party," meaning a party at the fashionable Wellesley House apartment building on Sloane Square in London, and misunderstood it.

I'm confused: Wellesley is a women's college in Boston. Why would there be gay men at a house party there?

"Good Neighbor is unable to take your call at this time. Please leave a message."

When I was young, back in the Dark Ages, gay bubbles were hard to find. I was fascinated by it the first time I was taken there when I was 19--it felt so liberating to be in a place where everyone was gay or gay friendly, and I could openly be whatever I wanted to be. On one of my first visits, I found myself sharing a pizza with Martha Raye down at the Cherry Grove dock one night, and another night I sat quietly in the room I was sharing with a friend, watching while he was making out on the sofa with Jerry Herman. It seemed like a dream for a shy gay kid from the Jersey suburbs. The world is very different today, and the idea of a gay bubble no longer interests me very much. I went back a few times in the 70s, but I haven't been back since the early 1980s.

The WTA tournament in Strasbourg last week created an interesting situation, because the final on Saturday was between Elina Svitolina of Ukraine and Anna Blinkova of Russia. Since it was a final, both players had to stay on court afterwards for the interviews and trophy presentation. They did not interact with one another, but were politely distant. As the runner-up, Blinkova was interviewed and gave her trophy speech first; to my surprise, she did it entirely in very fluent French. Then, as the winner, Svitolina spoke. Since she is married to a Frenchman and actually lives in Paris, she surely could have spoken in French, but after her initial "Bon jour," she chose to speak entirely in English. She may have done it just to accentuate the difference between them, but I also wondered whether, knowing how touchy the French are about their language, she was afraid the French audience might compare her competence in the language negatively to Blinkova's.

At matches, they usually do not announce the nationality of the players; on the scoreboard there is usually a picture of the flag of the country which the player represents next to his or her name. Many spectators don't pay attention to that, or don't recognize the flags. The current practice is to not show any flag next to names of players from Russia or Belarus; there are probably many spectators who don't know what that means, or don't know whether it means Russia or Belarus, which many people are not even aware is Russia's ally in the war. The flags are of the country whose tennis association sponsors the player, so in the case of Rybakina, the flag shown next to her name is Kazakhstan, even though she is Russian, and she is not the only Russian player who is supported by the tennis association of another one of the former Soviet republics, who don't have many home-grown players. (Quick! Do you recognize the Kazakh flag, or the flag of Belarus?) I would not have booed her, but I would not have applauded her either, because I don't think it is appropriate for players in an individual sport to openly disrespect an opponent solely because of the opponent's nationality.

This is a difficult topic. Some Ukrainian players refuse to shake hands with opponents from Russia or Belarus simply because the opponent represents a country with which they are at war. Some may be afraid that a photo of a handshake will be used against them in a propaganda war by one side or the other. There is also the question of which player wins or loses the match. All of the Ukrainian players are outspoken against the war, but most of the Russian/Belarussian players take no public position, probably because of fear of retaliation against them or their families by the Russian government; Daria Kasatkina, one of the top Russian women, has criticized the war, but her opponent still did not shake her hand. Then there is the sticky question of how to treat the Russian players who play for a country that is not included in the war, the most notable being Elena Rybakina, the current Wimbledon champion, who is Russian and lives in Moscow, but officially plays for Kazakhstan. There is also the question of someone like Viktoria Azarenka, a veteran champion who is a citizen of Belarus, but who has lived for years in the US. There is also the personal issue of the Russian and Ukrainian players who have known one another and played amicably for years before the war. Aryna Sabalenka is #2 in the world, and is generally popular with fans and with her fellow players; she is from Belarus, but many spectators are not aware of exactly where she is from, or of Belarus's connection to the war. Kostyuk is a young player, and many fans probably don't really know where she is from either. Sabalenka beat Kostyuk pretty convincingly, and she seemed to be headed to the net to shake hands, while Kostyuk made it obvious that she was not going to acknowledge her opponent, and looked like she was flouncing off in a huff. To many fans it probably looked simply like she was being a bad sport about losing a tennis match, and that was enough to generate the boos.

I am reading A Voyage Long and Strange, by Tony Horwitz, a Pulitzer Prize-winning American journalist known for books like Confederates in the Attic, who died four years ago. When he realized how little he really knew about the early history of European interaction with the Americas besides Columbus "discovering" America and the Pilgrims landing at Plymouth Rock, he started exploring places like the Viking settlement in Newfoundland, the places Columbus visited on his later voyages in the Caribbean, the routes taken by the Spanish explorers like Coronado and DeSoto in what became the US, etc. Along the way he discovered many interesting local people and events, like a "re-enactor" festival in Florida, where he got dressed up in authentic Spanish Conquistador gear. As I read about his travels in places mostly ignored by tourists, I wondered if he were gay; although he was married with children, he seems to pick up companions easily in bars, and his family doesn't interfere with his long travels alone; along the way he picks up men who seem happy to travel with him, even stay with him in sleazy motels. (The Dominican Republic Bureau of Tourism would not want you to read this book.) He also uses non-academic language ("Oh, shit! We're fucked.") that one wouldn't find in a typical historian's descriptions. He smoothly integrates his serious academic knowledge about Columbus--a more complicated character than one usually learns about--with his own experience on his voyage of discovery. I am finding it very enjoyable.

I was thinking that he looked almost younger than 24.

I think few of us would have had difficulty figuring out which man was Ferrero and which were his "friends."

When I see an ad for an escort in Philadelphia, I am sometimes curious enough to use the "map me" function, but most of the time it says that the escort is located next to City Hall.

Yes, but it takes a lot of folding to find the news items among all the Mattress Showroom ads.

If he plans to meet you at the Cherry Hill Mall, he probably doesn't do in-calls.

Thanks for the footnote, which is news to me. I agree with everything else.

BTW, if height is an issue for you, Santa Fe is 2000ft higher than Albuquerque.

I grew up reading the New York Daily News, since it was the only NYC paper my father bought. I can't imagine bothering with it now. The only digital paper I subscribe to is the NYT, so I will have something to read on my iPad when I am traveling. At home I want to read a real paper that I can fold while I am eating, not something on a screen.

It says that he has been on Rentmen since 2011; most of the pictures are from 2017 to 2019; the stats say he is 39, but the text obviously hasn't been updated for some time, because it claims he is 35.

Poor guy has been bumped so much, and now you want to bite him, too?

I have friends who live or have lived in both Albuquerque and Santa Fe, and twenty years ago we seriously considered retiring to Albuquerque, which is less expensive than Santa Fe. Albuquerque is much larger and less artsy and touristy than Santa Fe. There was a fairly laidback gay bar scene in Albuquerque then, but I know nothing about what it is like now. I did have a younger distant cousin who is straight, who worked for the local newspaper, and she said there was a lot of corruption in the local government--so much so that she soon decamped to Santa Fe (actually to Taos). We looked at housing in Albuquerque with a realtor, and one certainly got more for the buck there. The only people I know now in NM are retirees in Santa Fe, gay and straight, who moved there from the East Coast and wouldn't live anywhere else.

It would make a great RomCom script, but I suspect that the reality would be awkward, if not uncomfortable for both of you, given your history.

He definitely has an Edge.

It depends on whether the duo is a couple or only two guys who will work together. If it is the latter, trying to hire only the preferred one is usually no problem. If you are trying to separate a pair who think of themselves as a working unit, you are navigating a much trickier situation. If possible, you should contact the one you are more interested in and and inquire how they feel about working separately, and hope he gives you an honest answer. The dynamics of one couple can be very different from those of another.

To some extent it depends upon what one considers "upscale." A lot of poor neighborhoods in the central city began gentrifying in the 1960s, and still have maintained their upper-middle class residents today. In former working class neighborhoods like Fitler Square and Queen Village, residential real estate is still pretty expensive. The little brick workman's row house near 23rd and South, built for the workers in the Kelly brickyards, that we bought in 1970 for $13,200, recently sold for $625K. From river to river and Spring Garden to South Street, it is hard to find any neighborhood in Center City that qualifies as a "ghetto of poverty." Even parts of West Philly around the universities, like Powelton, are relatively expensive. However, there are miles and miles of North and South Philly that are pretty sad to contemplate.

Mt. Etna erupted today, and there are reports that ash is falling on the airport at Catania.

Aaagh!!! 24 pieces of mail in my spam folder today! The spammers must have been on strike last week.