I called my parents to tell them I landed safely and I got all these questions about the weather here and if my roommates were home and whether they had peanuts on the airplane and on and on, and I almost snapped. I didn't need to have the phone passed from my mother to my father-- I had seen them both TWO HOURS PRIOR.

All I wanted to do was hang up and open my mail and talk to my birds and have nothing to do with anybody for a little while. I need room to breathe.

It wasn't the trip to Los Angeles that made me feel this way-- in fact, I feel like I didn't get to see nearly enough of my contingent there. I'll tell you what it was; it was having my father here for three days.

Hanging out with my father was something that I know I'll be happy I did in twenty years. But I had to make that my mantra, because it was mostly a tense experience, at least for me. I think he had fun. He told me about twenty times that he had fun. Every time he asked, "Well, did you have fun?" Like my saying, "Yes, I had fun," ten times was not enough for him.

I don't know why I'm so uncomfortable around my father. He doesn't really know me, he has all these ideas about me with no connection to reality, and all these expectations for me, like if I woke up one morning and decided to, I could go be a talk show host, or a PR manager, or a Starbucks marketing director, or whatever the fuck. It's a constant vibe of, "You're wasting your life. When are you going to do something I can be proud of?" And the paradox is, of course, that he is proud of me too and thinks I am smart and special enough to do anything.

It's weird. It's hard to explain. I just hate fielding the questions. I hate the scrutiny. I hate that he's not as smart as my sister and I are. I hate that he doesn't understand me at all and my attempts to get him to understand me fail so completely. I can't even talk about it; it's bringing on an anxiety attack.

We did have fun though, got along better than I anticipated. I tried to keep smiling the whole time, keep the conversation flowing and not try rebutting any of his opinions about how I should be living my life or how the world should be run. You'll be grateful in twenty years. In twenty years...

Then today, he commented that I hardly talked to him at all when I got to Los Angeles. I'm just like, Jesus, I spent three days with you. You can't have all my attention. I know he just wants to prolong this feeling of closeness, but I want to shove him as far away as possible. I don't know why he has this effect on me. I wish I had the first clue.

Enough of that. I really think I am having some kind of panic attack over it, so I have to stop talking about it. I've often wondered if I've repressed some childhood trauma. It seems completely unlikely, but it would explain a lot.

Getting to Los Angeles was a real relief. I was able to be myself, finally, after three days of putting on a façade I had no idea I was putting on.

The whole weekend was also a good antidote to Boy Flakiness that's been going on in NorCal. (Grrrrr. Arrgh.) It's wonderful to be surrounded by people who have loved you for years and years, and who you've been loving back for just as long. People who know you so well, and make you feel beautiful and smart and witty and special. People you consider to be all those things. People you know will always be there for you, your touchstones.

Speaking of touchstones, it was weird not having Tim there. Usually he's the first person I call when I get to my parents' house, and he comes over half an hour later. Everyone wanted to know where he was, everyone thought it was bizarre that he wasn't there. I thought I'd gotten used to not having him around, but apparently not. It did feel a little strange.

I love hanging out with my sister and her girlfriend and my cousin Lucy; right away I felt comfortable again. I think it was that first night that I got to meet one of their new good friends, Tanya, who fits right into our demented little crew. Goofy sense of humor and she laughed at all my jokes, so what's not to love?

I basically just hung out with touchstone type people for the rest of the weekend and laughed my ass off. Looking back, it seems that we watched a great deal of porn. Hilarious though: Random Polaroid Guy, Girl With One Brain Cell and the Worst Boob Job Ever, Cute Girl with the World's Ugliest Vagina, Amber Depthcharge and her Dick Sucking Lips, etc.

I also shopped-- somehow, I came back with the new Weezer CD, some lip gloss (which is, according to Amber Depthcharge, the way you "put on your DSLs"), a Buffy mug from my sister, and a birthday present for someone.

On Saturday night I met a friend for dinner, and we will call him "Eric" because that is his name. He's a friend from back in the day who I lost touch with for awhile (due to unfortunate Marcy-related circumstances-- our friendship has been fraught with such circumstances) and it's been great to talk to him and hang with him again.

On Sunday was the retirement party. My mother actually hired an "exotic entertainer" although we begged her not to. The dancer showed up covered in balloons, with the whitest ass I've ever seen, and did the most boring dance I've ever seen. (Not that I could see very much from between my fingers.)

The funniest thing about this was when Tanya thought one of our relatives was the stripper. (This relative is sort of a family joke-- she's in her late 60s and still dresses in fuck-me pumps and bitty tube tops-- it was an honest mistake.)

My sister took a great picture of the old people (my grandmother's friends) sitting on the couch, watching the stripper. We call it "Old People in Shock." One lady is shading her eyes and pointing. In the background, you can see me and Bruce clinging to each other and cringing with embarrassment.

I got to see Bruce (who looked hot, incidentally, with his new bleached hair and ice blue shirt) and Charlotte and Bruno (I miss those crazy kids) and Rose (I'm sure I've given her a different name before, but anyway she's the girl who grew up across the street from us-- yet another surrogate sister). Matthew turned up later when we were wrapping up the night in the hot tub, to tell us the story of his visit to a "massage parlor" when he was in San Francisco. All I can say about that is.... mouth presshaaah?

I hope this story doesn't embarrass him, but I'm fascinated by the way it works, and being from a Dutch family, I really see no problem with the sex industry. You go there and pick a girl (or two or three) and get a massage, and at one point they roll you over and make suggestive gestures and ask, "Hand presshaaah?" Next, they offer "Mouth presshaaah?" or make a thrusting gesture-- sadly, there's no question that goes, "Vagina presshaaah?" But I guess if you want any of that, you can overcome that barrier, eh?

And speaking of the sex industry, Tim called me from Taiwan! (Okay, Tim hasn't been partaking in the sex industry in Taiwan, but I needed a segue.) He's having a great time, getting wined and dined like nobody's business. He said he was going to eat some of that special Kobe beef-- have you heard of this stuff? There's only twenty cows in the whole world, and they feed them sake and massage them daily. I haven't eaten beef in years and years, but I would make an exception to taste some of this meat. It's supposed to be mind blowingly good.

I told Tim to take some pictures for me-- I can't even imagine what Taiwan looks like, although he told me about it-- lots of scooters and pollution. I'd love to see pictures. I'm glad he's having fun. I'm hoping to be able to persuade him to go to Europe with me sometime, and either he'll never want to get on another 14-hour flight in his life, or he will be bitten by the traveling bug. It could go either way, I think.

I enjoyed my trip home; silence and anonymity felt very nice. I took the AirBART shuttle to the BART station, then took the BART home. I contemplated taking a cab to my house, but ultimately decided to walk, since that would mean I didn't have to converse with a cab driver. Plus, it's less than a mile away, and what with the luggage and the hill and all, it was good exercise.

So that's it until next time-- Abby and Ash are coming for Gay Pride at the end of June, which is when my beloved Jen will be staying with me, so we'll have a full house. (Especially if Tanya and Lucy decide to come along, or Bruce and his new boyfriend.) I will probably head back again later in the summer-- maybe even July, if fun things are going on.

Oh, I forgot to mention that at Burbank airport, I got pulled out of the boarding line and sent to the security checkpoint, where they re-checked all my stuff and made me take off my shoes and everything. I wonder why the guy flagged me-- maybe because I was traveling with a passport (the damn DMV, I've been there twice and paid them $24 and I still don't have my license) or maybe because my shirt has the old NYC skyline on it, and the Twin Towers are right on my left boob.

Yeah, of course, it had to be the boobs. One way or another, they always manage to get me in trouble.

"We called Josh, who agreed to come hang out with us. We didn't know what he looked like, but speculated that he was probably a 400 year old Russian man with a twitch. This turned out to be untrue! Josh is around 30, probably not Russian, and hardly ever twitches."