I am sincerely very, very sorry for beating up that gay man. I was minding my own business, sitting on a bar stool, and he came up next to me and kept on touching me. I warned him several times to back off, but he wouldn't take no for an answer. Finally, after he groped my genital area, I snapped. Even though he's small and I'm huge, I genuinely felt afraid for my life, so I did what I had to do.

And I am really very sorry for assaulting that Greek priest. He was wearing a robe and sandals and I'm a Marine but he still had me fearful for my life. I was minding my own business when he came up and shouted "Allahu Akbar," which is what Muslims yell before they blow you up, and then he tried to touch my penis. So I had no choice but to chase him down the street and hit him with a tire iron.

And I am very sorry for beating up that old Hawaiian man. He was wearing a loose grass skirt, which made me think he was hiding a weapon. And then he did the hula, where every movement tells a story, and the story he was telling started out "I want to touch your penis," so I hit him repeatedly with a coconut.

I am also sorry for hurting that old Jewish lady, but she called me "bubelah," which is Jewish for "I am going to make you eat knishes until your stomach explodes!" And then she grabbed my cheek really hard and squeezed it, which made me think she was going to grab my penis next and cause it physical harm. So I smothered her with a potato latke.

Last, I regret killing my lawyer, but after he got me acquitted of all these charges he tried to high-five me, and that made me think he was going to grab my penis next.

I now kneel before the court and beg your forgiveness, but I gotta warn you guys, if anybody gets a groin within half a mile of me, well, you know what's up.

There's one major benefit to living in New York. Take three steps in any direction and you'll find something amazing to do.

I went up to Shady Hollow for Halloween, because it seemed appropriate. That's where Washington Irving wrote his Headless Horseman story, and he's buried there. They've got to have crazy celebrations, I thought, but after a 90-minute train ride I discovered the city offered nothing more than thousands of SUVs circling the downtown streets, dropping kids off at karate and picking up drycleaning.

Back at Grand Central, though, I found a wonder. Disney had converted an entire working train into a promotion for A Christmas Carol, covering it with billboards and replacing the seats with scale models of all the sets, photos of the stars, and interactive displays showing how they did the special effects. In the last car, the pièce de résistance: have a computer snap your photo and it'll morph your face with Scrooge, Tiny Tim, or some chick who looks like Julia Roberts.

I snapped my photo, morphed it with Tiny Tim, and the result was fabulous. My wrinkles were gone, my eyes were no longer yellow, and my sallow, sunken cheeks were red and full as apples. I gave them my name and email address so they could contact me when the photo was done. Clinging tight to my claim check, I raced home to fetch my photo and post it online.

There's one sad fact about the internet: it exists solely to force you to send personal information to capitalist enterprises so they can spam you every five minutes and convince you to buy worthless crap. After giving Disney my details at Grand Central, now I had to open an account at Wal-Mart -- yes, Wal-Mart -- to claim my photo. It was an amazing photo, I reminded myself, so adios privacy. I gave them everything they wanted, relatively sure that tomorrow morning a Greeter would be at my door at 7 a.m. wanting to power-walk to the nearest location with me.

Once I'd officially joined Wal-Mart, I checked my photo status. Not ready. Check back. If it still don't show up in seven days, get in touch.

Seven days elapsed. I emailed.

They emailed back pretty quickly, though at 10 at night, which I take to mean "Our customer service is in New Delhi!" Evidently my name, address, password, and eighteen-digit claim number weren't enough to identify me. Now they needed my mother's maiden name, Social Security number, and guesstimated weight of Rue McClanahan. You know, just for security. Just to see what was happening with that pic.

I emailed everything they wanted, and once again they replied at ten that night. Here it definitely turned spooky. "We received your email and to ensure we provide you with accurate information, we are researching the matter," they said. "We will call you with the requested information within the next 2 business days. Please respond with an updated contact number or your preferred contact method so we can resolve the issue."

Yes, now they needed a phone number.

And that's exactly what I needed: some Iowa housewife calling me when the sun came up, saying, "Mr. Hans, we still haven't found your photo, but did you know Glade Electrical-Outlet Adventures come in tangerine-vanilla now?"

Honestly, I don't need to talk to anybody. Nobody needs to call me. And for sending photos around, my preferred contact method is EMAIL. Because the pony express moves so slow.

So, now I have to send them a third email -- SUBJECT: RE: TO ASSIST IN YOUR RESEARCH REGARDING THE MATTER OF A PHOTO OF A DUDE MORPHED WITH TINY TIM. I'm already guessing how they'll reply to that: "We're hot on the trail. Please send us your underwear."

Really, you should have seen the Christmas Carol Train. Fabulous. Literally millions of dollars were sunk into this thing. And then Disney partners with Wal-Mart, where Two Dollars Means Two Hours of Hard Work.^TM

I'm letting it go. It doesn't matter. Who cares about a computer-generated photo of me looking attractive? Put it in perspective. I mean, if they'd been subcontracted to process NASA's photos, they'd probably still be waiting for John Glenn's sperm sample and we'd still think the moon was made of cheese.

Pope Benedict XVI sings and prays along to a mix of modern music and ancient church chants in a new album entitled ''Alma Mater -- Music from the Vatican." The pope's voice is interwoven with eight original pieces of contemporary music and Gregorian chants.

The record is being released on Seriously Deaf Jam.

There are a couple problematic homosexuals in the news today. Which actually isn't too bad, considering our problematic counterpart in the heterosexual community is a family values-spouting ex-cheerleader who, we recently discovered, filmed herself while waving her pompoms and exhorting viewers to spell "C-L-I-T-O-R-I-S."

State Senator Rubén Díaz Sr. is one of New York's most homophobic senators. Two of his brothers are gay, though, along with many of his friends. "I love them," he says. "So how could I be a homophobe?"

Well, here's a hint, dude. You argued that the Gay Games shouldn't be held because they would spread HIV. You personally sponsored a rally against gay marriage in the Bronx, busing in 10,000 evangelical homophobes to bolster your argument. You sued the city to shut down a high school for gay and transgender students.

You don't need Miss Marple to spot the clues, buddy.

I'm fed up with bigots denying reality. I mean, if we interviewed Hitler today, I'll bet the first thing out of his mouth would be, "Personally, you know, I like the Jews!" I'm thinking the dictionary is partly to blame. Homophobia is defined as "the irrational fear of homosexuals," which makes it sound like if you don't run screaming from us, you're cool. For somebody to qualify as homophobic, they've got to rank gays right up there with confined spaces and rats.

While one might think homosexuals would have a problem with Mr. Díaz’s agenda, Christopher Lynn doesn't. He's Mr. Díaz’s chief counsel, though he's gay and partnered. They all double-date, though nobody mentions whether, during good-night hugs, pepper spray is involved. Mr. Lynn unapologetically declares that Mr. Diaz is “a true believer in Christian values, in treating people the way you want to be treated."

Corinthians 8.27.1: And Jesus dragged the sissies from their safe space and exhorted, "C'mon, be a fuckin' man!"

In similar denial is fashion designer/director Tom Ford. "If you said name 10 things that define me," he says, "being gay wouldn’t make the list." Wow. I'm not saying it has to be in the top three, but if it's not top ten you have a problem. When "being gay" drops below "enthusiastic ice skater" and "Fiestaware collector" I'm thinking there's something wrong inside your head.

Ford compares himself to Christopher Isherwood. "There are many gay characters in his works," Ford says, "because his work is so autobiographical, but their gayness isn’t the focus."

Maybe I'm having an acid flashback, but that was called "being in the closet" in my day.

Ford says, "The one thing I liked about Isherwood’s work -- especially when I was younger and grappling with my sexuality -- is that there was no issue about it in his writing."

On the other hand, normal teenagers who read Mr. Isherwood's works notice that all the heterosexuals are running around having fun and screwing everything that moves while the homosexuals return to their hotel rooms alone to think about Berlin and arrange flowers. Admire Mr. Isherwood's discretion if you want -- we have yet to find a film of him instructing us on how to spell F-E-L-L-A-T-I-O -- but considering he was quite promiscuous, I'm thinking somebody needs to refresh his memory on what "autobiographical" means.

I don't mention this to a lot of people, but last year I choked on a chunk of pineapple lurking at the bottom of a Jamba Juice smoothie and I died for three minutes. Luckily a paramedic nearby gave me the Heimlich Maneuver and brought me back, but I was out long enough to see absolutely everything that's on the other side. It was so unspeakably unsettling that I'd just about blanked the whole experience from my memory, but on Queerty today I see some photographer has captured the scene I saw.


Believe it or not, the afterlife looks exactly like this picture. Up above there are all these absolute perfect gay men who are wandering around in towels, looking down in judgment at all the gay men who aren't quite up to snuff. Really, it's just like being at the gym. Well, except there isn't a naked old Italian guy sprawled across a vinyl chair, watching everybody change clothes with his legs spread wide open, like "Sure, I could towel-dry my balls, but I think I'll just let air do its thing."

Everywhere I look there are near-naked, oily men cavorting, screaming, hollering. I can make out some skyscrapers, and a streetlight, and I see Jesus hovering there. Toss in eight dudes dressed as stewardesses and it could be West Hollywood on Halloween. I go up to Jesus and say, "Um, I think I'm supposed to go to heaven," and he says, "Sorry, dude. You didn't hold me close within your heart, plus you've got 23.7% body fat."

So, he sends me straight to hell. Literally I'm flung atop a heap of sweaty, anguished bodies, to fend for myself. A cute Cuban beneath me says, "This is how I pictured Carnival Cruises," and I totally agree. Well, except here nobody's going to hold a Hairy Chest Contest, and even though we're being burned alive and our limbs rent asunder we still draw the line at board shorts.

Honestly, it's awful. Everybody is complaining, like "Who's the bitch who reserved all the lounge chairs?" and "I know you're busy, Lucifer, but I've really got to have an egg-white omelet." Naturally some queen brought her dogs, and let me tell you, Mariah and Whitney are absolute bitches if they don't get their Iams precisely at noon.

Anyway, I see these cherubs blowing what looks like cocaine on the crowd, so I race over there, but it's a trap. All these pigeons poop on my head and the cherubs laugh and as I realize there are no hair care products down here whatsoever I totally get what God's going for. I repent of everything sinful I've done -- asking forgiveness from all the people I've stepped on who didn't specifically ask for it -- and for the very first time since college I wake up with Jamba Juice in my mouth.

Ever since the minute I was born, I've been asking questions. Why doesn't anybody talk about why Aunt Janet has a man's haircut and a girlfriend? How come we can afford sherry for Mom but I'm stuck with Kool-Aid? And why don't newspapers, so prone to blathering on and on about meaningless things, cut to the chase with words that everybody uses, like "fink" or "creep" or "asshole"?

As for the latter, at least, I'm still wondering. I mean, all these words are in the dictionary, so technically they qualify for print. They have concrete definitions, so their use isn't subjective. Really, there's nothing much that separates them from words like "dictator" or "accountant" or "fry cook," and those are words newspapers use every day.

It actually seems like a conspiracy. Journalists drone on and on, using all the words in a definition, when they could save time by jumping ahead and using the actual word. You don't see this in the food section. "Dice an edible member of the lily family and saute in the yellowish fat obtained by churning cream." You don't see this in the automotive section: "For sale: 1994 Ford Compensated Part-Time Companion, runs good."

They're not dodging these words out of politeness. They don't hesitate to label "dictator" or "puppet" or "terrorist," as long as it's foreigners they're talking about. They attack Saddam Hussein, Hugo Chavez, and Fidel Castro, when frankly I'd pick at least two of these dudes for my government before anybody in George W's unlabeled cabinet.

But where are the harsh words for Rush Limbaugh? James Dobson? Dick Cheney? They're clearly logic-challenged, hate-mongering liars, yet from the absence of any strong descriptors in their press coverage they frequently come across like Kurt Cobain without the guitar.

Is it xenophobic cowardice? "All the News That Won't Offend"?

Nowhere is this dodge more obvious than in the coverage of the recent elections. We've always claimed to have equal rights in America, yet voters in Maine created a distinct lower class for gays. Instantly the word "hypocrite" comes to mind. They divided their state into the entitled and the unentitled. If some girl in your high school did this with birthday party invites, the word "bitch" would have been used.

And how about the recent news that two gay men were arrested in Salt Lake City for kissing on a downtown plaza? Turns out the city officials sold the plaza to the Mormon church -- a group renowned for their bigotry -- so they can do whatever they want with it. They can literally confront everyone on the plaza and decide who's suitable. "Hetero? Go ahead. Homo? Find yourself another sidewalk."

And nobody cares.

Gays get arrested for trespassing -- refusing to tolerate second-class citizenship -- and nobody cares.

Now, if the city government had sold this plaza to Satanists, and the Satanists sat outside in lawn chairs and said, "Declare your allegiance to Beezlebub or you shall not pass!" I'm thinking something would be done.

So, we've got a government that does something discriminatory and stupid. We've got a population that doesn't complain. It's like seeing a sign that says "NO BLACKS ALLOWED," then glancing down at your pale skin and thinking, "Whew! Thank God I'm cool."

Clearly, harsh words are deserved.

They say print is dying, and I'm thinking this cowardice is a reason why. I'm more likely to read The Onion than the New York Times, partly because The Onion doesn't mince words. "HOLY SHIT! MAN WALKS ON FUCKING MOON!" is one of their classic headlines, and I'm thinking regular newspapers would do well to capture some of that truth.

"MOST PEOPLE IN UTAH ARE ASSHOLES!" and "MAINE VOTERS DECLARE: YEAH, WE'RE BITCHES!" would have been a good place to start.

Archaeologists have learned much about daily life in the twenty-first century from this fragment of a catalog found in New York City that dates back circa 2010. Though the hard data this catalog offers is woefully inadequate, we can perhaps find the answers to some of our questions in the photographs.

Life must have been quite harsh, because there are no adults to be found in the entire catalog. The children pictured range in age from newborn to preteen, leading researchers to project an extremely brief lifespan. In what seems like a flagrant violation of child labor laws, the boys spent most of their time assembling weapons using miniaturized, standardized hardware known as Lego blocks. Perhaps answering our question about the abbreviated life span are the numerous pictures of young boys battling dinosaurs that, while small, were apparently quite vicious. In these pictures, the boys stoically bear their fate, fighting these brightly-colored beasts with short, blunt-tipped spears or foam-bullet air blasters that, quite frankly, would have offered pathetic protection against these beasts.

The outcome of these battles is easily seen in the paleontological record. Lots and lots of fossilized bones, but nothing from the tiny dinosaurs.

While today we have clearly defined castes to which one is assigned at birth, during this epoch every female was apparently a princess. Some researchers guess that perhaps the middle- and lower-class females were sacrificed to the tiny dinosaurs to win respite from their attacks. While today it might strike us as relatively comic to see a parade of princesses wandering the streets, all those tiaras must have served as a tearful reminder of the plight of the lower class.

Due to the absence of a support staff, however, the princesses bore the responsibility of running the castles themselves. This princess -- her name and lineage aren't given -- bears her responsibility with a smile, clearly telegraphing how much stronger children were in the past than they are today. With no parents or indeed any adults to assist them, they had to push their food in tiny carts around their kitchens, and -- in clear contrast to today's royalty -- had to get all the meals on the tables themselves. That's assuming their spouses weren't killed by the ever-present miniature dinosaurs.

As for those tables, they were oddly inexpensive at the time, but today they would be worth a king's ransom. This one, for instance, appears to bear extensive amounts of inlaid semi-precious gems, cloisonné, and gold leaf that must have kept an atelier of artisans busy for many years. In a highly-publicized auction today, it might retail for close to a million yen.

Of course, to our eyes this style seems dated, if not laughable. With the pink castle motif running from tiny cupboard to table to chair, one can guess what the aristocratic toilet looked like.