our swedish pal was in town for the week and with her studied encouragement, there was much going out. thursday involved grooving our asses off at APT on the west side. now, those of you who know me know that i'm an east sider at heart and rarely make it across broadway. oh, the things we do for friends. well, within five minutes of our arrival, this adorable australian kid is all up in my shit and the rest as we say is history. picking up at a primarily straight night is truly the holy grail.

friday involved another arrival from out of town, yummy grub out at Diner in williamsburg, a wander through the burg's numerous nightspots which was abruptly cut short by a tumble onto the concrete, knocking a tooth out in the process. thankly not my tooth. we all jumped into superfriend mode. it is amazing how sober you can become in a crisis. although we made haste back to manhattan and the emergency room, it was too late for the tooth. drag.

saturday really was just recovery mode. sunday was some shopping in the east village and the upper west side. talk about culture shock. one never considers just how downtown one looks until one starts getting odd looks (you know, the "you're out of place" looks). not a down the nose thing or a touristy thing. just a "what are YOU doing in OUR neighborhood?" thing. later, out to the beauty bar and then another sojourn to the west side for our swedish friend's last night. this time she got the action, and as the evening progressed, the crowd became more and more hip young west side queer and i spent a significant part of my time chatting with fag hags whose fags wouldn't even deign to speak with me. goodness. sometime i forget that i would rather be surrounded by cool straight people than a bunch of tired, self-important queens.

all in all, a fab time was had by all. and besides, i booked my tickets to the dominican republic yesterday. so there.