Thursday, December 20, 2007

Gay Monopoly/John Waters/Gift Exchange/Bday

Lots to discuss! I should do this more often. I found an article in Xtra today about a game called Gay Monopoly. This is amazing. Released in 1983 by the Parker Sisters, the company was immediately sued and very few copies were able to be sold, fewer still remain today.

About the banker for example is written: " …choose this person carefully. A good choice would be someone who watches Let's Make A Deal often or perhaps a player who frequents S&M slave auctions. If no one fits these descriptions, at least, get someone who occasionally buys his own drinks. If you are still without a candidate, just settle for anyone who enjoys deposits and withdrawals and who looks cute wearing nothing but a banker's visor. With this last one, make sure she keeps her hands out of the till. She is likely to have had so many sugardaddies that she will confuse her own cash with that of the Bank."

Ollie's Sleaze Bag cards

The meaning of this deck of 31 cards corresponds the most to the familiar Community Chest cards, like:

Go directly to Straight City - Do not pass Stonewall Savings.
Your Madame Butterfly Halloween costume was to die for - Collect $ 43 - 2nd prize.

So I knew immediately I wanted one. A search of eBay turned up nothing. I was talking to a guy at work and he goes "Oh, I have one." He bought it new in 1983 and was willing to sell it. So $250 later I am the proud owner of Gay Monopoly. I offered the price, I just thought "If this came up on eBay, how much would I bid before I was outbid at the last minute and pulled out all my hair?" I'm collecting gay themed memorabilia from yesteryear and what better slice of gay life in 1983 is there?
In other news I went to see John Waters on my birthday. It was a lot of fun, he's a great storyteller and talked for about an hour and a half.
There was a potluck lunch for Christmas today at work, I brought meatloaf. Really this was a little short-sighted of me, who goes "Wow, the meatloaf is here!" So it wasn't that popular, but I really liked it. Then we had a gift exchange. I ended up with a 3000 pound paperweight which I plan to give to my boss tomorrow. It was hilarious, everyone was told to bring in something between $10-15 and someone brought a gift bag with 2 things in it:
1) A picture frame with no glass in it suitable for a wedding photo from 1982. The back of the frame was black velvet and it looked like a cat had slept on it for quite a while
2) A plastic serving tray. This was a stackable tray, missing parts so it couldn't be put together. The plastic was cracked. The box had severe water damage and was held together with an elastic band. I said "Was this someone's wedding present from 1962?"
I can't believe anyone would be so cheap. I brought an electronic Yahtzee game which a lot of people were interested in and ended up going to this woman who was desperate to give it to her 5 year old kid. Yeah I'm sure that kid gets the concept of a full house. What a waste.
It was my birthday on Saturday, I turned 29 for the first time, each subsequent birthday I will be 29 from now on.
I've been watching a lot of Bill Nye lately, he's got a new show "The Eyes of Nye" which is really smart and taught me about 600 different things I didn't know in 45 minutes.
This weekend I'm going to my aunt's for a family Christmas where everyone has to get a picture with underwear on their head. Don't ask me why, I think they're missing chromosomes. I'll be posting it on the blog, never fear.
Until next time!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

"This weekend I'm going to my aunt's for a family Christmas where everyone has to get a picture with underwear on their head."

Can't you just offer them one from your portfolio?