Seven days of staring at my increasingly saggy, almost-51-year-old moobs in the hotel-bathroom mirror is MORE than enough for a man my age to endure

so for the first time in a week I’m back at the gym with a fresh dose of C4 Ripped Sport Explosive Energy & Cutting Formula pre-workout coursing through my veins and itching under my preternaturally sweaty skin and I have only two days to look like a 25-year-old supermodel so LET’S DO THIS.

Literally the only Broadway show I could get a ticket to on my (hopefully) last night here is Beetlejuice, which has been getting pretty dismissive reviews

I was even ready to throw in the towel and finally see Phantom, but it was sold out early in the day. So I got a ticket to this show. This show. This show.

The irony is our last flight out tonight just got canceled so we’ll be staying an unplanned night here

The fortuitous thing is we’d already booked an extra night in our hotel because we had points and we didn’t want to haul our luggage to the theater.

Remember how last year my Big Birthday Broadway Bash Blowout! was delayed NINETEEN HOURS

because of bad weather and broken planes and canceled flights and I ended up DRIVING IN A CAR WITH COMPLETE STRANGERS ALL THE WAY TO O’HARE to get on the last possible flight to NYC and I ended up getting there at 2:00 am and I missed my Jimmy Fallon taping and my window for a show the night of my flight in? Remember? REMEMBER?

IT’S. HAPPENING. A. GAI. N. N. Nnnnn.

Our goddamn plane broke between the gate and the O’Hare runway and then officially was declared out of service and we came back to a different gate and got kicked off and the guy seated behind me had already established himself as totally goddamned obnoxious because He Was The Most Important Person On The Plane Who Therefore Will Kick Me Repeatedly In Every Way Possible Even From Under My Seat and Now He Had To Get Off Immediately Because Fuck All You Little People so I made a point of getting in front of him as we got in the aisle and OH NO IT TOOK ME A VERY LONG TIME TO BEND OVER AND PICK UP MY CARRY-ON FROM UNDER THE SEAT IN FRONT OF ME AND THEN OOPS I FORGOT MY BOOK SO I HAD TO SEARCH FOR IT IN THE SEAT POCKET HMMM WHERE DID IT GO OH THERE IT IS so that part was at least kind of awesome but anyway American just happened to have a spare of the almost exact same plane just sitting around—kind of like I do with peanut butter and lack of boyfriends—so our flight wasn’t canceled but we had to move to yet a different gate WHERE THE DAMN GATE AGENT ALSO PRONOUNCED IT CONCI-AIR and now we’re on the plane and we lost our exit row and Cap’ Assholepants has resumed kicking me plus the guy next to him is playing shitty music really loudly because of course he is and I’m doing the math in my head and I’m pretty sure I’ll still get there in time for a matinee but in the mean time look at my selfie and say our new gate number really fast and you’ll know what I think about my Big Birthday Broadway Bash Blowout Bad Breakdown Bummer Bane Bungle Burden Bullshit Boobies.

I might have added boobies at the end just to see if you were still paying attention. Or to complete the rhythmic alliteration. Or because I’m catastrophically immature.

Nine years ago today I saw A Little Night Music on Broadway

If my flight arrives on time today, I intend to see Hadestown this afternoon AND All My Sons tonight (with Burn This as a backup if I can’t get tickets to one of those).

But the O’Hare gate agent keeps pronouncing it conci-AIR as she’s calling our boarding groups so we might have to have an ugly altercation and I might not be allowed to get on our plane.

Dasvidanya

My nephew leaves tomorrow for a J-term in Indonesia. Which I think is a suburb of Mexico because he picked our best Mexican restaurant for his goodbye dinner. I mean his bon voyage dinner. Achtung!

SPOILER ALERTS:

The Lusitania sinks. There’s a war. Everyone eventually dies. I give the VERY AWESOME book to someone else to enjoy. Sondheim writes a breathtaking show that gives me the gay shudders. I start reading the book about it for the second time. I regret bringing a massive gallon of already-watery-already-flat Diet Coke on my plane home.

Asses, asses and more asses

Read all about these asses and their asses here

I find myself having a difficult time caring about these two self-absorbed asses and what they're about to face, but I am worried that the evangelical American Taliban will blow this story into a rallying cry around this "proof" that all gay people are perverted degenerates who brazenly commit "religious insults" (because -- for the purposes of this one specific news-cycle outrage -- the American Taliban will suddenly become VERY concerned about the cultural sensitivities of foreign religions) and then dotard will opportunistically climb on board to get points for hating gays AND punishing them -- though, as always, he'll have zero influence on anything to do with their punishment or anything else in the world for that matter -- and his shit-drooling minions will be emboldened to exhibit even more hate toward even more people in this pervasively toxic political environment he and his mouth-breathing orbit continue to breed, grope and propagate.

Happy and safe running today, NYC!

Seven years ago this weekend I went to New York, saw some shows, had dinner with some lifelong friends, and ... oh, there’s something else I’m forgetting here ... shows ... dinner ... yes! That’s it! I ran my seventh (and so far last) marathon! With Jared from Subway! Well, not really WITH him; Subway was not going to let him embarrass the company with any kind of marathon-related scandal so they had him running literally in a ring of elite runners who made sure he crossed the finish line ... right in front of me. The jerk. He went on to pursue other scandals soon after the marathon, while I went on to curse my decision to leave all my cash in my hotel room during the marathon so I had to hobble more than two miles around marathon blockades from Central Park West to East 45th Street after the run because I couldn’t pay for a cab. But Woody Allen saw me cross the finish line, so the entire race was like a red carpet gala. I even took home a big shiny award, which I self-congratulatorily wore along with many of my crippled marathon brethren to LAX the next day.

Of course, all of this was back when the only thing runners had to focus on was the joy of running through 26.2 miles of cheering crowds in all five NYC boroughs and not being wounded and murdered by terrorists. The 2017 NYC marathon is happening as we speak, under 26.2 miles of heavy security — a week after multiple pedestrians were murdered in a terrorist attack in lower Manhattan. I’m sitting here in Iowa unable to protect today’s runners so each one can experience the same euphoric joy I did when I ran, but I know we’re all putting our trust in the extended local law enforcement to keep everyone safe. I don’t know if I know anyone who’s running today, but my heart is with everyone, and I’m excitedly cheering from afar in the hopes that today’s marathon is as thrilling — and safe — as mine was for every runner.

You know what I like to do? Hate you.

"My big foreign trip"? "That's what I like to do"? You're a president, not a foreign-exchange student to Mexican finger-painting school.

Why are his trousers vermilion?

After work tonight I made a trip to my packed-to-the-rafters-with-everything-and-I-mean-everything-I-owned-in-Chicago-when-I-moved-home-two-and-a-half-years-ago storage locker with the faint hope of opening a handful of 30+ boxes and stumbling on four long-buried things: my passport, my running medals, my running bibs and some sort of documentation that shows the cost basis for some meager investments I made 30 years ago with a man who's no longer alive at a company that no longer exists.

Do NOT get me started on the cost basis documentation ... or the fact that it doesn't automatically follow your investments on their inevitable journeys through endless cycles of portfolio selloffs and acquisitions and companies that cease to exist. DO. NOT.

But! Look at everything I DID find:

• My passport!
• My running medals! Which may or may not be jumbled up with a few random disco-ball necklaces!
• My running bibs!
• Plus! Clockwise from the top:
• Cards Against Humanity!
• A little figurine I bought in Barcelona 15 years ago of a folklorical boy squatting over a tiny, fresh pile of childish bad taste! Because why not!
• A $25 IHOP gift card!
• The abovementioned bibs and medals and disco balls and passport and let's get back to the fun stuff
• Long-forgotten-but-still-very-gay Broadway CDs!
• A dented York Peppermint Patty!
• BONUS! A pair of so-gay-they-make-their-own-obscure-Sondheim-references vermilion jeans that can't possibly have ever fit over my hips because right now they look like they won't even fit over what's left of my pride

There's also a massive unopened box sitting right next to me AS WE SPEAK labeled "summer clothes and shoes" that holds the promise of overflowing with something magical and/or even-more-pride-crushing since it was packed and sealed over two years and two waist sizes ago. I'd tell you I won't open it until later when it's not late and I'm not tired but we all know I'll be ripping into it before I even finish writing this po

If you took this on a plane ...

Would it be a catty-on or a purrsonal item? Asking for a friend.

Flush with excitement

One of the small pleasures of two-leg flights going home to smaller markets like Cedar Rapids is the higher probability that you'll run into people you may know when you get to your final-leg airport gate, which is usually tucked away charmingly in a bubbling drainage ditch behind a haphazard pile of desiccated cows six miles of hardscrabble terrain from the last functioning airport bathroom. And when you change your flight at the last minute, you often get the very back seat on your tiny puddle-jumper-to-smaller-market plane. Right next to the lavatory.

My final score for this flight is 0% people I know and 100% very back seat right next to the lavatory.

My painful distended abdomen and I can't wait to get home.

Super Bowl glory

Five years ago I actually headlined the halftime show at the Super Bowl. Well, technically I just led my team to confetti-covered victory at the Super Bowl. Well, technically I just had seats over the dugout with Gisele Bundchen at the Super Bowl. Well, technically I just sold commemorative popcorn at the Super Bowl.

OK, fine. I was just in Indianapolis the weekend of the Super Bowl. But I was visiting my gracious and hospitable friend Bill and we had a great time touring the Super Bowl village and riding the Super Bowl shuttle with Madonna and shopping at the Super Bowl store that had a convenient mortgage department right inside the door to help us buy commemorative shirts and other merchandise.

But I didn't need a mortgage or commemorative shirts or merchandise because I had my $12 all-purpose sportsing shirt. And that's all I needed to inflate my footballs.

Key words

Fourty-Three
I crossed back into the prime numbers last week. And since 43 is kind of a wishy-washy number that has neither the young sexiness of 42 nor the august milestoniness of 45, I went home to Iowa to age quietly with my family. We celebrated by doing fun uncle things, hanging out accomplishing nothing, and eating our weight in cake and ice cream and homemade pie and pizza. For a non-remarkable-age birthday, it was remarkably fabulous.

Cancerous Moles
My birthday always means it’s time to go on my annual mole patrol at my friendly neighborhood dermatologist. Because I’m a moley person. And it just seems prudent to make sure my moles aren’t trying to kill me. Because then where would they go to grow and raise families and contribute to society? You can’t thrive on a dead body. Unless you’re a maggot. Or Maggie Gallagher. Anyway! I had a couple suspicious moles removed and biopsied in 2005, but I’ve managed to escape the dreaded mole knife since then. Until now. Because in two weeks I get to have two more moles hacked out of my dermis. But at least this time they’re not in the middle of my back (which makes replacing bandages all but impossible ); they’re almost twin moles on the lower, way-more-reachable parts of each thigh. A quick read of my blog post from 2005 reminds me that I wasn’t allowed to work out for two weeks after the last biopsies as the stitches healed. A quick check of my vanity calls bullshit on that for 2011.

Vacation Days
I have officially used up my entire allotment for the year. Well, technically not yet; since I’m not training for a marathon this summer and therefore not beholden to a draconian weekend running schedule, I’ve booked fabulous getaways from now until Labor Day, all through the weekends when I’d normally be getting up at 4:00 to pound out anywhere from 6 to 22 miles. So watch out, Rehoboth, D.C., Saugutuck, New York, Provincetown and Cedar Rapids! I’m coming to visit you this summer!

Twenty-Five
One of my vacation trips will be to my hometown for my 25th high school reunion. There’s even a Facebook page where people post nostalgia-related comments about favorite bands and local hangouts and fashion faux pas from the mid-1980s. I’m still weirdly fascinated by the fact that this group of people I knew before the Internet existed now all have email addresses and Facebook accounts. Not to mention grown children and third marriages.

Forgetfulness
I had about four more vocabulary-word-related topics I wanted to cover here as I was formulating this blog post in my head, but once I sat down to actually write it, I can’t remember what they were.

Pill Organizer
I’m now on so many old-man medications and supplements I had to break down and buy an old-man pill organizer. Here’s a picture of it open to the pills I took on my birthday last week:
Fun game for pharmacology aficionados: Guess what’s wrong with me based on the pills you see! Decoy alert: One of pills I take every morning is plain old vitamin D.

Things I have cleaned

My pee shoes
Even after repeated scrubbings with harsh chemicals and a stiff brush, my favorite tennis shoes still smelled like, well, a cat peed on them. And since they float, their one adventure in our crappy old top-loading washing machine was as effective as a Sarah Palin. But! Our magical new front-loading washing machine rotates and re-rotates and sloshes and spins in such a way that my incredible floating shoes couldn’t get away from the water and the suds (and the dash of bleach I threw in as a precaution) … and now they’re as clean and awesome as the day before the cat even discovered I owned them.

My weightlifting gloves
They’re made of leather and some stretchy elastic material. They’re designed to wick away moisture and improve my grip and prevent calluses and make me look extra-butch when I’m throwing the ol’ weights around the gym. But lately they’d started to smell like my arm did after it had been in a cast for six weeks. And if you’ve ever smelled cast rot you’d know it’s not the way to attract the ladies. Even if you look extra-butch. So I threw them in the wash with a load of darks thinking the worst thing that could happen is they’d come out in pieces and I’d be out a $15 pair of one-year-old gloves. But! They came out just like they were before … minus the smell of rotting flesh. Everyone wins!

My winter coat
This paragraph does not come with a compelling story. My big old puffy Gap winter coat hadn’t been washed since I lived in my highrise and had access to the front-loading washing machines in its vast laundry room. And now that we have a front-loading machine in our low-to-the-ground vintage condo I decided to wash it again. And it came out nice and clean. See? Boring story. But with a clean-coat ending!

My family’s clocks
The domestic partner and I spent Valentine’s Day weekend in Iowa with my family, where my eight-year-old niece and I proceeded to kick the, well, clocks off of the domestic partner and my sister (both of whom are well over eight years old) at Sequence. And then the domestic partner and I tied for the win in a full-family Game of Things, which would be a lot more fun with just adults but we all managed to squeeze in some inappropriate answers without corrupting the children too much. For instance! The thing that would make school more fun: I won with Underpants day! The thing you’d hate to find in your sandwich: I won with Grandma! The thing you should never do when you ride a bike: I won with Hold a leaky bag of pudding! I am clearly a winner. Which is why we won’t mention the three games of Rummikub I played while I was there. And if you try to bring it up, I’ll just shout out one of my winning Game of Things answers until you give up and go away. Underpants day!

Things we hope to see in NYC this weekend

Next to Normal

God of Carnage

Bye Bye Birdie or Hair (there are people from my home town in both shows!)

Or any of at least 10 other shows we'll be glad to get last-minute tickets to

The marathon

Some random NYC friends I emailed today with last-minute notice that we'll be there tomorrow and Sunday

Jessie Pavelka (but only because I hope to see him everywhere I go)

Letter from Ottawa

Dear all. Stop. Ottawa rocks. Stop. Never coming home. Stop. Please send my stuff. Stop.

Our day started at 4:00 am Chicago time in Kingston. Since then we've spent five hours shooting, one hour eating, three hours driving, one hour scouting locations, two more hours eating, one hour sightseeing ... and I'm not good at math but it's now almost 10:00 Chicago time and I feel like I've put in an entire week since I woke up.

But! Our project is swimming along fabulously, everyone here is freakishly nice, I have no idea how anyone got anywhere before GPS devices became standard issue in rental cars, I have no idea how GPS devices actually work but I'm so very, very glad they do, and I've crossed a few firsts off my list.

For instance! I finally had poutine. This Canadian standard is just french fries with gravy and cheese curds. And while it was very tasty, I've never been a gravy person. Though the bowl was conspicuously empty once I got done with it. But only because I wanted to be a polite guest in this lovely city.

I also had a Beaver Tail, which is little more than flat, fried sweet dough slathered with any number of sweet, delicious goo options. It's apparently very Ottawa. And the place we had ours is the very same place Barack Obama had his on his last visit. So he and I are almost exactly alike. Except I support marriage equality.

The Beaver Tail and the poutine places, by the way, are part of this charming street of markets and shops:

Which is not far from this beautiful river:

Which looks like this at night:

It runs by the breathtaking Château Laurier, which is literally a freaking castle:

Which looks like this at night:

And it's down the street from the not-un-castle-like Lord Elgin Hotel, where I'm typing this as we speak. I'm in one of the corner rooms on that knee-like structure sticking out of the building on the left:

And the people and the history and the scenery and the Beaver Tails and the Lord Elgin are so incredibly fabulous I've decided I'm never coming home. So please send my stuff. And throw in a few bucks while you're packing it up for me. My expense account runs out tomorrow. And I seem to have expensive tastes in hotels. Plus Beaver Tails aren't exactly cheap.

Can I just say one thing about Canadian customs?

My company travels to meet our Canadian client about four times a month. We do a lot of work for this client. Great work. Great work that generates staggering amounts of consumer spending. Canadian consumer spending. In Canada.

Now I'm sure that as a general rule it's important to make sure people aren't crossing into your country to write bad advertising about you. And I'm sure the Canadian customs agents wage monumental front-lines battles every day to prevent U.S. agencies from crossing the border and polluting the Canadian advertising landscape with slogans like We put a big can of Can in Canada!

But a couple months ago a Canadian customs agent wouldn't let one of my colleagues into the country on a business trip because she didn't have her college diploma with her. I am not making this up. She had her passport, a copy of our contract with the client and a letter of authorization from our company president. But as it was explained to my colleague, Canada is in a state of orange-level alert against a looming threat of improperly credentialed business travelers. So my colleague was flat-out refused entry into the country, where she might help stimulate the Canadian economy without knowing all her predicate verb conjugations.

This is my first visit here since she was refused entry. And I'm traipsing through three Canadian cities in three days with my goddamn college diploma in my suitcase. I know it's not a huge imposition to be carrying around a diploma. And nobody demanded to see it—or cast doubt on my professional abilities in any way—when I got off the plane this morning. But the fact that I have to have it with me just in case is more ridiculous than someone as retarded as Glenn Beck getting his own TV show.

And I know other people have far worse horror stories about crossing international borders. And I'm sure many of those stories involve U.S. border agents. Or those volunteer militia dorks who stand guard at the U.S.-Mexico border with their self-righteousness and their Second Amendments and their booshy moostaches. But none of this makes the college-diploma thing any less silly.

But! If you ever make it through customs and find yourself in downtown Kingston, Ontario, grab your passport and your diploma and make sure you have dinner at Chez Piggy ... preferably on the patio. The food is delicious, the ambiance is charming, the prices are reasonable, and the parking is free and plentiful. And the sign is just adorable:

See you in a week!

We're boarding the ship for our fabulous Caribbean cruise. I'm all packed and ready (I think) with a fresh haircut, a pedicure (gay!), a fake tan and a gallon of SPF 45.

While we're gone, please make daily purchases from my sister's gluten-safe baking mix web site. Just click here: