Good afternoon, peeps - if you're up here in the northeast, hope you're bundled up and keeping warm - what feels like a sudden cold snap has chilled us to the bone and although I'm writing this from my desk in my living room, I may be moving the whole operation to my bed for a few hours. Usually I do other things in my bed than type on my computer, but today I'm willing to make an exception. It doesn't help that in addition to shivering, I'm sniffling and sneezing too. Yay. I really do love winter, but not at this specific moment in time.
That's as good a transition as any to talk about warmer days - July 15 last summer celebrating Witti Repartee's birthday at Bingo as a fundraiser for Iris House. Our special guest was the then recently crowned Mr. Fire Island Bear, Chris Pagano.
If you don't know Chris, you're missing out on a genuine pound and a half of real man beef with a good heart and a great sense of humor. He was one of a half dozen contestants who gathered at Cherrys on Fire Island last June to compete for the oh so coveted title of the first "Mr. Fire Island Bear". It was a packed crowd and the night was kind of thrilling as both Beardonna and Vita Summers did multiple numbers and our judges - Beardonna, Vita and Bambi Sue and Killer from HX mag days of yore participated by being on stage at times for various parts of the contest. As they say in the Wisconsin I came from, a good time was had by all.
As a side note, Chris will be stepping down exactly four months from today, on Saturday, June 11 again at Cherrys. You can click here to go to the Fire Island Bear weekend contest page and sign up to be a contestant in our second go round or just get the info you need to come out for the weekend and have some fun with us. Daniel Nardicio and Logan Hardcore are joining us again this year, see schedule for deets.
At Bingo, Chris graciously brought along a jockstrap to auction off and the bidding was fierce eventually going to La Diva an Imperial Court pal of Witti's who generously gave without hesitation. My favorite photo from the night was from the auction where I pulled the jockstrap out and it reminded me of an old Coppertone ad. LOL! You can see this shot along with the rest of the pics by clicking here (thanks AB for taking so many great photos!)
Speaking of the Imperial Court, on Saturday, March 12th, the Court will celebrate 30 years of "Night of a Thousand Gowns"! Over the years they've raised thousands and thousands of dollars for New York LGBT charities. This year the show once again takes place at the Marriott Marquis in Times Square. As always, it'll be a big show filled with production numbers and gorgeous costumes (plus, of course, a full dinner although there is an option to only go to the show later in the evening but it's a standing room only ticket). You can see full deets at the Imperial Court site but be warned, they're overhauling the design so it might be a little confusing.
As you may remember, Witti was the Empress of the Court a few years ago but not being the current one in charge hasn't diminished Witti's community service - in January, she held her third annual "Broads, Bawds and Bachelorttes" event to benefit Iris House at the Metropolitan Room and raised a whopping $4500! Then, earlier this week, Witti starred in a staged reading of "Die Mommie Die" as a fundraiser for New Alternatives. She has a monthly show at Excelsior in Brooklyn (next one is tonight, Thursday, February 11th and then the next one is Thursday, March 10th) and, this July, I'll be co-emceeing her annual birthday party at Rockbar (naturally, more info to follow). PLUS if that's not enough, she's got a new project brewing matching talent to non profits for their events... more on this another time. :)
Whew. That's all for today - I'm going to take a hot shower and force this cold out of me. More tomorrow!
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