You guyz! You guyz!! You guyz!!! One of my favorite things EVER is coming to Denver! It’s called Bike Smut, and it’s rolling through Denver on May 8. Bike Smut is exactly what it sounds like; it’s a two-wheeled celebration of sexuality and transportation. And. It’s. Awesome. I first stumbled upon this treasure of short films shortly after I discovered that I really enjoy watching creative, independent erotica in large theaters. This was a whole new world of goofy people having fun and not caring what others thought about them. I loved it. Then I found out that goofy people can have fun... Read More

Spring is in the air, which mean lactic acid is in my quads: it’s running season again. I mostly spend my time in this column talking about entertainment, but a lot of my life consists of doing stupid physical things like flogging my body over 26.2 miles of pavement in the hot (…and sweaty, and painful) pursuit of a “free” bottle of Muscle Milk and a medallion stamped with “Finisher.” I’m not sure why I do this. Running that far doesn’t yield any more fitness benefit than running half that distance. It hurts a lot. It uses up a lot of my disposable time. It may be a mental disorder.... Read More

Insomnia and I have been bitter sisters for a long time now. She knows my secrets and reminds me of them, over and over and over during the tiny hours when all sensible and peaceable people should be sound asleep. I admit that some of this is my own fault. My two favorite cocktails war it out; Sudafed and caffeine team up against melatonin and merlot. Eventually I decide that the drugs aren’t making me feel better, they’re just making me feel a different kind of bad. Then it’s back to just me and Insomnia in a monogamous, monotonous relationship. I lie awake and fester in my thoughts, or... Read More

By my current estimate*, roughly 29% of social media is devoted to decrying why social media is so terrible for us. They’re not wrong. We spend a shocking amount of time comparing other people’s carefully-curated presentations of their mundane lives to our own, known-to-be-dreary existences. People who I know are boring as dirt in real life look like rock stars online. I am not immune to this: my phone tells me that I spend upwards of two hours a day staring at it, which is far more than I have ever spent staring at any lover I have ever had. Make of that fact what you will. I bring this up... Read More

I have a special place for broken-down clowns in my broken-down heart. A few years ago, I concluded that the dude I was hanging out with for months was never going to actually ask me out on a date and I would need to take matters into my own hands. I invited him to be my escort to the Boulder Fringe Festival. I picked him up wearing lipstick, a fancy sundress embroidered with chevrons, and beaded sandals. He wore cargo shorts, flip-flops, and a t-shirt he got for free at a software conference. I felt super special. We spent almost an hour watching a silent clown make his musical way through the... Read More

I sometimes feel like the universe wants me to be a lesbian, despite (as far as I can tell, after a great deal of introspection) my straight orientation. Many people, including multiple men I’m actually out on dates with–even literally in bed with! make of that what you will– have asked me if I’m really gay or bi. I have owned big, shaggy dogs. I wear corduroy pants and drive a Subaru Outback. I do not, however, have a side-shave haircut. I recently had a friendly chat with a woman at a networking group who suggested we get a drink at a later date. She was a fun conversant and I... Read More

Live theater is magic. That’s why I love it so much. There’s a long road between the initial impulse to express something theatrically and the concurrence of ability and opportunity to weave magic with an audience. Lots of us aspirants walk that road via open mics, which have a bit of a dodgy reputation. Open mics are notorious for being Late at night Weird Of poor quality. They’re the modern day pig-in-a-poke, a grab bag of unknown quantities. Performers come to workshop material, polish their chops, get some recognition from an audience. Coffee houses are known for endless three-chord-sad-song... Read More

I showed up because I was promised snacks. My editor coaxed me to attend a benefit at the Ogden Theater this weekend with the promise of a pair of VIP packages. Each was supposed to include One General Admission ticket Meet & greet and hors d’oeuvres w/ The New Mastersounds & DJ Williams Shots Fired Access to the VIP Viewing area Color Red Vinyl Package and 2 Color Red IPAs (21+ ONLY) I had no idea what a “Color Red Vinyl Package” was. I still don’t. I also didn’t see a single snack the whole time. I left my muggle job early (I work second shift) and wiggled into my concert... Read More

There’s a part of every wandering heart that wants to join the circus. A few of us actually do it; the rest of us write about it and while vainly wishing that we had better abs. Such wishing sucked up most of my Friday evening this week, what little was left after red wine with a girlfriend. The wish session happened after the bitch session and both were flights into escapism and delights of pondering fantasies. In particular, we pondered the abs we’d like to see and the abs we’d like to have. Circus performers tend to have terrific abs. Denver is getting to be a great town for circus, with... Read More

I’ve never had much truck with communism. I was born in the 80’s and have only the faintest memory of the Berlin Wall coming down. My ultra-Conservative scholastic education impressed upon me that the only success of the Soviets and the “Red Chinese” (yes, that was the actual term used) was to slaughter and starve millions of people. This impression was not wrong; Stalin and Mao weren’t fun people at parties. And it left me with a deep distrust of anything labeled “The People’s,” whether that’s an army or an industry. Thus, it was with some skepticism that I learned that there’s... Read More