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Hello I'm Rich Brown and this is my personal website and blog. I'm just your simple, average, down to earth, professional, out gay man and aspiring circuit boy, living in Phoenix, Arizona with a few things to say while trying to find my place among all the scary, conservative, religious nuts in this sick and twisted world.
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Saturday, October 30, 2004 |
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Home From Philadelphia
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@HOME. Back home today. It's nice to be home again. I really can't believe that tomorrow is my birthday already. It seems as if this year has just flown. I'm actually looking forward to Tuesday to have the elections finished. I'll be sitting by the television most of Tuesday night for the outcome. The amount of advertising they all have on television now is rediculious. I can't imaginge how anyone can still be undecided in this race. Anyway I think we are probably going to head to the Rise Phoenix event tonight and do some dancing. Well I'm off to go relax a bit. Cheers!
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Back To Philadelphia For My Grandmothers Funeral
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@IN-FLIGHT. Right now I’m sitting on United Flight 1501 on my way back to Phoenix from Philadelphia. On Saturday, while I was outside doing some yard work around the house, I received a phone call from my cousin Terry letting me know that my Grandmother had passed away earlier that morning. Not a very pleasant reason to return home, but I flew out to Philadelphia on Tuesday morning so that I could attend my Grandmothers funeral on Thursday. The flight in to Philadelphia had a brief layover in Chicago and was otherwise uneventful. Because my Mother does not really feel comfortable driving far, I had resolved that rather then try and find someone to pick me up at the airport I would just take the train out to my Mom’s. I was surprised at how convenient it was to catch a train from the airport to 30th Street Station and then transfer to another train out to my Mothers. It was about an 1.5 hour trip total. The train ride reminded me of taking CalTrain from San Francisco down to work in Redwood City. It was actually a very nice trip. Not having been back to the Philadelphia countryside for over 2 years I was surprised at how much the scenery of the train ride resembled the London Countryside. I guess I’m spoiled at the fact that everything in Phoenix is brand new. Back in Philadelphia you realize that the city has been around since the 1700’s and has quite a bit of history.
So it was great to see my Mother again. She picked me up at the train station in Exton, closest to her house. It was both strange and sad to leave Justin and Berg. This is also the first time in over a year that I’ve traveled without Justin. The funeral was held at St. Joseph’s, the Catholic Church where I grew up in Coatesville. My Grandmother had planned everything out to the tee. She had the all the arrangements made and paid for since 1993. I guess 20 years of living alone gives you plenty of time to plan. She was 91 and lived a very long and happy life. It was an open viewing and she looked good, she looked at peace. All of my cousins and family were there to pay their last wishes. I saw cousins that I haven’t seen since I was a child. It’s a terrible reason to get the entire family together but nonetheless it was good to seem them again. I had the realization that I may never see many of these people together again. That was also a sad thought. Following the funeral, Mom and I went to Jim’s Steaks to grab some real Philly Cheesesteaks. Yum! Man I miss the real cheesesteaks from back home.
So it’s now Friday and I’m on my way back to Phoenix. I could have stayed the weekend but it’s my birthday this weekend so I wanted to get back. I’m still not sure if we are going to do anything but I wanted to be home anyway. I miss Justin and Berg.
This trip has made me realize 2 things. The first being how much I actually miss traveling. The second is how much I miss Justin when I travel. I guess that’s sort of a catch-22, you can’t really have the best of both worlds. I’d really love to travel again for work, but not to the extent where I would be out all week and only home on the weekends. Some occasional travel would be nice, but I don’t see that happening anytime in the near future. Alright well I’m going to relax a little bit since I have another 3 hours of flight before I get into Phoenix. Cheers.
Labels: Travel
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Saturday, October 23, 2004 |
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Insomnia, Work and Berg
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@HOME. Ok so it's 2 am and I've just been putzing around a little bit here on my computer. Justin is in bed because he has to work in the morning and I'm about to head to bed. We went over to the Meury's tonight and had some wine and just hung out talking for the night. Tomorrow is the Meury's 5-year anniversary so we'll be pooch sitting for the night.  Things seem to be getting a little better at work, which is good because I really don't feel like going through the hassle of finding another job right now. With all the layoff's that happened on Monday, we lost 3 people on my team. It was pretty sad, but to be honest I'm just glad that I still have a job for now. I received a fortune cookie the other day stating that I would be soon changing careers. We'll see if that holds to be true or not.
I think I'm going to head to bed for now. Nothing really new to report. Same old boring stuff at work. Justin and I are probably just going to hang out and watch movies tomorrow, nothing really excting. I'm just looking over now at Berg and he's sleeping next to me. He's so cute. I think I'll take a picture here and upload it.
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Thursday, October 21, 2004 |
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Lunch With The Gays
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@WORK. I'm just finishing up work now and waiting for Mark to get done so that we can leave. Mark and I have been carpooling pretty much every day to work. Helps us both with the traffic and the gas so I don't mind. It's a small loss of flexibility but at least in my opinion it's worth it.
So Jason, Joey and I went to lunch at Pei Wei today. It was fun. Joey is so quiet and Jason is so over the top. I just can't believe what comes out of that boy's mouth half the time.
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Wednesday, October 20, 2004 |
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@HOME. So today is the big day, the day when the new 'Plan' is supposed to be clear at work. They announced a few weeks ago they were going to lay off 4,500 people and most were going to come from the back office, meaning no customer facing positions. After going through this two times before, it's just not a pleasant experience. Anyway I've been assured several times by my manager that our team has nothing to worry about. I hope he's right. Anyway we have a meeting at 1 pm today to find out what's going on and how things are going to be restructured. This should be really interesting.
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Tuesday, October 19, 2004 |
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@HOME. Well it was an interesting week off from work and now I'm back. I was just sitting here uploading my pictures from this weekend. So to go back a bit, last week was started out with Philip arriving for the first weekend. He was here with his brother and his brother's partner to look at some real estate. They are thinking about buying an investment property here in Phoenix. So we hung out in the evenings, went out to dinner and drinks. Nothing especially notable, but it was a fun time for everyone. Philip flew out on Monday and the next few days were spent by Justin and I just relaxing a bit. On Wednesday, Justin, Mark, Andrea and I went down to Tempe to watch the debate and be there for the Post-Debate Kerry rally. It was awesome. We had tickets which got us into the center of the rally. Everyone was going crazy and the mood & energy there was incredible. They were handing out posters to everyone and United States flags to wave. Also the Foo-Fighters were there and playing during the break. Shortly after the debate was over, John Kerry and his family showed up at the rally with the governor of Arizona, Janet Napolitano. We were literally 2 feet from the raised walkway where they were coming by and shaking everyone's hands. I would have tried to shake his hand but I was too busy taking pictures. The crowd went crazy and he spoke for about 10-15 minutes. It was an awesome experience to be part of this and to see American democracy at it's best. I did end up getting a Kerry Edwards poster for my living room window.
So Thursday was pretty much another relaxing day for us both. We packed up our things for the weekend. On Friday morning we dropped off Berg at Mark and Andrea's and then headed out right around 11:30. We decided to trek down the I-10 through Los Angeles and stop off in West Hollywood for a few hours to hang out. Unfortunately we hit traffic in Los Angeles which extended our driving time by a few extra hours. We did manage to get into West Hollywood around 7 pm, parked and walked down to the Coffee Bean to grab some coffee. Justin and I walked around a little bit on Santa Monica Blvd. and went into a few stores. We then headed back to the car and took a short drive down Sunset Blvd. and up to Hollywood Blvd. We decided it was time to get headed down to his sister Sarah's in Oceanside which was our destination for the weekend. We headed down the I-405 and traffic was bumper to bumper almost the entire way. It turned into a 2 hour drive before we arrived in Oceanside. So once in Oceanside we call Sarah to meet us ... at the gates of Camp Pendleton, the United States Marine base, where Sarah's husband Jed is stationed and we were staying for the weekend. After being harassed by the young guards at the front gate for a few minutes we were finally let on base.
On Saturday we all went down to San Diego for the day. We had lunch at Rock Bottom Brewery and walked around downtown San Diego. It was funny we saw one of the Atlantis Gay Cruise Trips boarding a Royal Caribbean liner when we were there. We first noticed the rainbow flags hanging from some of the balconies and then realized we couldn't see a single woman on board. It looked cool and the ship was enormous. I think Justin and I would like to try a cruise one of these years. So after walking around a little bit we headed over to Coronado Island and down to Silver Strand beach. We we walked on the beach just after sunset and the weather was great. After leaving the beach we decided to head up to Old Town San Diego to the Hillcrest district. This is the predominately gay district of San Diego. After finally finding it (keep in mind it's been 5 years since I was last there and I couldn't quite remember the directions) we parked and went for some coffee. We walked around a bit, headed over to Balboa Park and walked the edge of the park and then decided to grab a drink at Hamburger Mary's. We soon decided that we better head back up to Oceanside for the night. We stopped at Denny's on the way and grabbed some desert before heading back to the base housing. On Sunday we got up and went over to Oceanside Harbor to sit by the beach and have lunch. Shortly after lunch, Justin and I said our goodbyes to Sarah and headed home. It seemed like a long drive back even though it was only 5 hours. I think we were both glad to get home, get Berg and relax before starting back to work on Monday morning. All said it was a good week and some much needed time away from work.
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Saturday, October 16, 2004 |
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@CAMP PENDELTON MILITARY BASE. Ok so my vacation is almost over and I still haven't written anything. Anyway Justin and I drove out to the Camp Pendleton Marine Base near San Diego yesterday to visit Justin's sister Sarah. Sarah's husband Jed is stationed here. We decided to go through Los Angeles and stop in West Hollywood on our way out. It's only a 4-5 hour drive from Phoenix to LA but we didn't didn't end up leaving until after 11am so we ran into rush hour traffic right when we got to downtown LA. Not plesant to say the least. So once we got to West Hollywood we parked, got some coffee and walked around a bit. It was nice to be back in a city and be able to see people out and about. It sometimes feels so isolated in the suburbs. It was a little cool out, around 65 degrees I believe, which is quite a switch from our still warm 90 degree days in Phoenix. Of course Justin and I both forgot our jackets at home, but it was a nice change from the heat. After we walked around a little, and went into some stores, we got back in the car and drove up Sunset to Hollywood Blvd. We drove past the Walk of Stars and the theatres and then made our way back to Santa Monica Blvd. to pick up the 405 and head down towards San Diego. Traffic was pretty heavy on the 405, so we didn't get to Camp Pendleton until around 10:30pm. We got to the front gate of the base and had to check in. After being harassed by the 20 y/o Marine about where we were going and who we were visiting, we were finally told to have a nice evening and let it. Sarah met us up the road a bit and we followed her to their house. This base is much larger then I imagined. It's just wierd being on a military base again. Anyway, I think we are going to head down to San Diego today and hang out. I'll write more later. Cheers.
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Tuesday, October 12, 2004 |
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@HOME. I can't understand how Justin can sit in front of the Playstation for hours without coming up for air. I'll just never understand that. I guess it's not really any different then my computer addiction. (No I didn't say or mean Porn ... get your mind out of the gutters!) Alright I just finished up the minor changes to my website and posted some new photos, something I rarely have time to do. I think I'm going to go and grab a bite to eat.
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@HOME. Thank god I'm on vacation this week. Not really doing aything exciting except relaxing a bit. I have a bunch of thoughts going through my head that I will get down later this week. I was just working on updating my site a little bit and I was thinking about a few past events recently where someone had to write out a nametag for me. The first event the woman asked me if I wanted her to put 'Dick' instead of Richard and the second event the woman asked me if I wanted her to put 'Rick' instead of Richard. What the hell is with people being so presumptous that they find it necessary to want to change my name. Anyway it bugs me. And just to clairify the point here, I didn't know either of these people in case you were thinking there was a reason she wanted to put dick. LOL. Anyway I have to go finish some things here. I'll write more later. Cheers!
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