The Lazy Activist
I’m lazy. I’ve known that for years. When I piss and moan to Matt that I need alone time – it’s not to do fun and exciting things behind his back. It’s to plop my lazy ass on the couch and watch bad network television.
When I say I’m going for a walk, it means I cross the street to the Harbor Park and sit on the dock to watch the boats go by.
When I say I’m going to clean the condo, it means I’m going to quickly walk around to make sure all surfaces look clear of clutter…but dusting and cleaning aren’t really involved.
And now, when it comes to the local political climate in Massachusetts with gay marriage, I’m a lazy activist. I’m so glad email exists because that’s essentially how I’ve addressed my lazy activism. And I’ve never even had to initiate anything. I just get my emails from the Human Rights Campaign and all of the other coalitions and then follow their easy steps to send letters to my state representatives. In fact, the emails create the letter for me. My job is simply to add extra text (if desired) and hit submit. The program finds my representatives for me. The other thing I do is send those emails to friends so they can do the same.
Did I attend any of the rally’s at the state house? No.
Why? Because it interfered with Golden Girls on Lifetime, that’s why. And as a gay man, it’s my duty to uphold stereotypes. That’s my contribution to the cause – we all help in our own little way.
On a happier note, Matt and I met at Mike’s Pasty in the North End after work. My goal was to get some pears, apples and bananas at the fruit store, but Matt wanted to meet at Mike’s. He talked me into buying chocolate chip cheesecake (since I just may have overdosed on cannoli), while he got himself a cannoli.
Later in the evening my friend, Salina, stopped by with her college friend after dining in the neighborhood. She also brought a box of pastries from Mike’s (including cannoli). I can tell that living in the North End is going to make me fat.
Speaking of cannoli, a few years ago I thought of a great business opportunity for Provincetown. Currently, the only bakery they have there is Portuguese. There are some fudge shops and the ubiquitous salt-water taffee places, but I think a decadent bakery is needed and thought I should open oned called “Karl’s Cannoli”. It’s got the necessary sexual innuendo for a place like Provincetown…and the alliteration is a nice touch. And all of the pastry items could have a similarly perverted name: Matty’s Creamy Eclair, Terry’s Tasty Tart, etc…
Now all I need is $50,000….and a baker.
Oh, and I took some photos of my commute this morning. Unfortunately, half way from the train to my office I ran into a co-worker and wasn’t able to photograph some key things. But I hope to post the pictures I did get in “Karl’s Photo Gallery” this evening.
7 Comments
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hi karl, thanks for visiting. i see that you must have followed matt into my site. 🙂
i have thought about the e-mail forms that HRC and other orgs send and ask you to forward to their reps. these people probably get a ton of spam and with such, i don’t know if they care if we send them e-mails. i think that if their real mailboxes were overflowing, that would be another thing. i don’t know. like you, i am a lazy activist. but i do believe one thing: when we are out in the open about who we are, then people cannot ignore us or put us back into the closet. 🙂
great job on the blog, keep it up and spread the word 🙂
My senators (Illinois) and rep (Chicago) always respond to the letter, fax, or whatever it is that I send from the ACLU site. Sometimes it’s just useless babble (usually from the one GOP senator, I’ve noticed). But they do, on some level, pay attention to it.
Ummmmmm….Baker here…and a damn good one….
Too funny — I am just as bad — tho, I did fax our horrid governor.
Hey…..at least you have coherent thoughts about what you should be doing…..and you act on it. Even if you didn’t make it out to protest live and in person. every little bit helps!
OH, i’m so excited to be mentioned by name in your blog. You’ve just made my day! 🙂
I’d apply for the baker position (hey, after all, you know I actually can bake…), but I’ll pass on P-Town. Damned hard finding a decent heterosexual guy in Boston, and relocating to P-Town would decidedly lower my chances of finding one. Heh.
If you come up with the $50k, I’ll do the baking!