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  Pork chops with mustard sauce. Photo by Diana Edwards.
Last night’s gastronomic get down was a culinary delight for queers and West Hillians alike. The atmosphere of Ethical Butcher Berlin Reed‘s meat meet-and-greet was the appropriately casual fancy that Portland so enjoys, and local farmers were rock stars and guests of honor. Diana Edwards and I caught the ‘Primal Cuts’ action on camera.
Bloodhound Photography‘s Ally Picard was also there to catch some snaps of food partygoers, but her real triumph was the small exhibition she displayed of photographs of Berlin and local farms.
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  Andrea Gibson performs Saturday at the Q Center (my bad)
Thursday
The good news is that you haven’t missed her, but hopefully no one trudged over to the Q Center last night to see Andrea Gibson on my bad advice. She performs Saturday the 20th. Description below.
Primal Cuts a raucous book release – PDX gays might be known for veganism but I’ve also met a damn lot of folks who have been lured away by the smell of bacon (or, like me, were too hedonistic to ever give up meat in the first place). But just because one is a foodie doesn’t mean one is heartless, so there has also been an upsurge in the discussion of where our animal products come from and how they get to our plates.
This party is in celebration of Marissa Guggiana’s Primal Cuts but I suspect the bigger draw will be the 16 whole animals coming from 3 different farms (all heritage meats), hors d’oeuvres from Salt, Fire & Time and The Ethical Butcher and a Hario Pour-Over Station from Intelligentsia Coffee. Plus all your favorite photobooths and DJs who will then move to the afterparty down the street at Homo-Deluxe.
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  Chi Chi and Chonga at September's Disco Miss Thing. Photos courtesy Just Out
Emerging from an occasionally painful adolescence Portland is finally enjoying the freedom of young adulthood (and college parties, whew!) and there’s no better example of this than our catty but loving drag scene. This year saw one the introduction of a truly well crafted drag competition called Miss Thing and this Friday brings its outrageous finale.
“I think drag has gotten somewhat of a bad name in Portland because there is so much sameness and traditional drag going on,” Co-creator Heklina Heklina has said. “Audiences and performers want to be challenged by ideas—another great thing about Miss Thing. There are no rules—no rules as to gender, what you need to look like or how you dress. All that matters is what you do onstage.”
Not that we’ve ever cared about a bad reputation, but we’re happy that now it’s a thematic, originally bad rep. And it’s all coming to a climax when the year’s best of the best take the stage to win 500 dollars and a trip to San Fran to perform with Trannyshack. And competition is fierce.
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  Queer acrobatics from the Collective-of-Geniuses
Events, gatherings and celebrations are already underway for Trans Empowerment Week leading up to this Saturday’s Trangender Day of Remembrance. Today at 6pm on KBOO’s Outloud (90.7FM) Tobi Hill-Meyer and Smitty Buckler will be talking with Sasha about TDR, a day dedicated to day primarily memorializes those lost to hate crimes, it also serves as a forum for transgender communities and allies to raise awareness around the threat of violence faced by gender variant people and the persistence of prejudice felt by the transgender community, trans justice and intersecting oppressions and the connections between violence and the mainstream adult film industry.
Though the TDR may have somber overtones, there are also plenty fun and affirming activities and performances.
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  Cindy McCain poses for NoH8
This Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell two-step is starting to really get on my nerves.
Only one high ranking military officer seems opposed to the repeal, Marine Corps Gen. James Amos. Even Republican Arizona Senator John McCain formerly stated that he would leave the decision to top military officials. However, as more and more officers came out in support of the repeal he has asserted his own opinion that we needed to wait for the findings of a study currently in progress. Now, as the study draws to a close, showing that most service members are indifferent, he moves even further from the side of rationality by telling reporters that it “isn’t the right study.”
Perhaps less politically important but even more frustrating, is his wife’s betrayal. And I mean to her own beliefs, not to her husband.
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  Lt Dan Choi
In an ironic bit of news today MTV reports that A Pentagon memo leaked today, appropriately Veterans Day supports the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.
Washington Post, quoting two people familiar with a draft of the report, said that it will say that the military’s lifting of the ban would result in “minimal and isolated incidents of risk to the current war efforts.”
According to the Post, more than 70 percent of respondents to a survey sent to active-duty and reserve troops this summer said the effects of a repeal would be “positive, mixed or nonexistent.” Those results reportedly led the survey’s authors to conclude that objections to gay troops would drop once they were able to live and serve openly with their peers.
In some other gay and vet’s day news, a service was held for gay vets:
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  Bulimianne Rhapsody and Melody Awesomeazing host Mrs. this Saturday
If you’re not too busy fighting the crowds at the newly opened international budget fashion boutique H&M there’s still plenty of good nightlife to catch out this wintery weekend.
Friday
Bent – Nopo favorite Bent is back for to squeeze your ass into that tiny dancefloor and do it queer underground style. With guest DJ Il Camino, Jodi Bon Jodi and Roy-G-Biv on the decks turning the Foggy Notion (3416 N Lombard) into the Faggy Nation I swear it will only hurt a little bit. Besides what else will you talk about of Craigslist the nest morning?
Babe Cave – For those more inclined to stay in the southeast DJs Lifepartner and Chelsea Starr are bringing the hotties to Holocene (1001 SE Morrison) and when Ms. Star says “crawl back into my cave” you don’t say no. For a hint of the music you can expect check out LP’s mix below.
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  Charles Kane now with his fiance
I may be part of the sensationalizing media for even mentioning the story of the man who had sex reassignment surgery once to become a woman and then again to regain his manhood, but I can’t help but comment on his assertion that they should be banned because those who want a sex change are “completely deluded.” Unfortunately, I think it is Mr. Kane (formerly Ms. Kane and Mr. Hashimi) who is misguided.
In the 1980s a one Sam Hashimi, a powerful investment fund type, had a sex-change procedure to become “glamorous interior designer Samantha Kane,” a woman so convincing he says he had no problem attracting men.
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  Joanne Pedersen, left, and Ann Meitzen are planning to sue because federal law does not recognize their Connecticut marriage. Photo by Christopher Capozziello for The New York Times
State and Federal laws often come into conflict, and gay marriage is a prime example of how confusing that confluence can be. Couples that are married in states where it is/was legal (5 states plus DC) may get all the state benefits to which they are entitled, but many benefits are given at the Federal level…which is where things get sticky…but not in a good way.
One big example of this is health insurance, which is a tough subject to tackle in itself. The New York Times reports on two cases where plaintiffs are suing the government in an effort to strike down the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), a 1996 law that prohibits the federal government from recognizing marriages of same-sex couples.
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  Former Providence mayor and RI Congressman-elect David Cicilline. Why are gay polticians always hotter than straight ones?
Although Nationally the Senate managed to keep Democratic control and locally Kitzhaber narrowly beat out Dudley, it was a pretty bleak election for queers and liberal allies. Three Iowa Judges were voted off the bench when opponents of same-sex marriage targeted them in an intense campaign to boot them off the state Supreme Court because of a unanimous ruling last year that legalized same-sex unions. But there were a few meager bright spots for queers.
Only recently have gay mayors of major cities started to become common….well at least not unheard of since the election of our own Mayor Sam Adams and Houston Mayor Annise Parker. Now, one has emerged in the South as Lexington, Kentucky elected its first openly gay mayor. Vice-Mayor Jim Gray was victorious Tuesday night in his second campaign for the city’s top job, beating incumbent Mayor Jim Newberry.
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