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Cock in a Sock… Part 2

As almost-promised in this first Cock in a Sock post, I took the plunge, stuffed my cock in a sock, and let it all hang out. I didn’t want to go the crass route and be almost completely naked like everyone else, so I tried to make it colorful and maybe a little classy. Nothing says classy like a fuchsia jacket!

Aimed at raising awareness and funds for testicular cancer, the hashtag #cockinasock took off around the world, and men started stuffing their junk into the soft ambulatory accessory and snapping selfies all over the place. For the most part, they were naked but for said sock. I’ve been naked before, so when everyone else started taking their clothes off, I put mine back on. I don’t do bandwagons.

Before anyone feigns shock or awe, let me remind you of this and this and this, and suddenly today’s post seems rather quaint.

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Justin Timberlake’s Probing Crotch Grab

Michael Jackson set the stage for the crotch-grab, Madonna kicked it up a notch, but Justin Timberlake may have perfected it. At least if we’re talking in-depth digital manipulation, as illustrated in these crotch-grabbing GIFs. Mr. Timberlake has teased with his cock before, and of course he’s been a Hunk of the Day, but I don’t think I’ve posted him in such, well, action. (He has, however, been seen quite naked here.) As have other nude male celebs

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Restaurant Week in Downtown Albany (Or, The Dullest Blog Post Title Ever)

While I’m not the biggest fan of the various restaurant weeks that go on in Albany and Boston, they do serve their purpose for those who don’t get out much. For those of us that do, they’re usually a disappointing exercise in which my favorite restaurants go cheap on their portions and service in the hopes of attracting the average non-restaurant-goer. But I won’t piss on this year’s Downtown Albany Restaurant week, where one can get a three-course meal for $20.14 – mainly because Downtown Albany (not to be mistaken for ‘Downton Abbey’ despite what my FaceBook and Twitter friends not-so-wittily say) needs all the help it can get. See, I am supportive of this city.  Eat your heart out, Downtown Albany!

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Madonna Wakes Me Up

Madonna is reportedly in the studio with Avicii (of ‘Wake Me Up’ fame). I enjoy the latter’s sole claim to fame, and can see Madonna doing something in this folk/dance vein quite well. I’m not sure it’s a groundbreaking collaboration, but it could be perfectly fine – and if her track record is any indication it will likely surpass what we expect. She has a way of forming a musical alchemy with just about anyone – I never thought I’d enjoy her getting on the Timberlake-Timbaland band-wagon, but ‘Hard Candy’ was actually a pretty decent pop record – so while some have scoffed at her seeking out Avicii, I think she may have found someone with whom some organic and new sounds might originate.

That makes this the perfect time to revisit her last studio effort, 2012’s ‘MDNA.’ It’s a banging album – one of her strongest in years – and one that went largely ignored after the flush of its first-week of sales. ‘Girl Gone Wild’ is a fun, throbbing opener, the beats of which are sustained and given additional jolts in ‘I’m Addicted,’ while ‘Turn Up the Radio’ is just about a perfect standard of a modern-day pop song, challenged only by ‘Give Me All Your Luvin’ for pure pop perfection. Deeper cuts like ‘Masterpiece’ and ‘Falling Free’ showcase her prowess with a ballad, and ‘Love Spent’ is a lesson in how to craft musical and emotional drama with a few clichéd phrases. ‘I’m A Sinner’ is an instant Madonna-anthem, a hands-in-the-air celebration of not being anything other than yourself. Lesser fillers like ‘Superstar’ and ‘I Don’t Give A…’ almost rise to single-worthy status, while a throw-away cut like ‘Some Girls’ provides the requisite clunker that she usually reserves for the last song. All in all, ‘MDNA’ is a pretty fine album, even by Madonna standards (which are always higher than the average bear’s.) Of course, my eye is already on what is yet to come… so wake me up when the wait is over.

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A Trojan Renaissance

Having waxed rhapsodic about the Victorian Stroll last winter, I find a growing soft-spot in my heart for Troy. Suzie’s even contemplating a move there, and tonight my parents are taking us out to dinner followed by a show at the Troy Music Hall. (The last time I was there must have been when I was onstage performing with the Empire State Youth Orchestra – not exactly the happiest of memories.)

Troy’s downtown area is a quaint one, with historical throwbacks dating to the 1800’s (I believe that parts of it were used in scenes from ‘The Age of Innocence’ to re-create the look of old New York City.) It retains that historical charm, with beautiful buildings and brownstones, and it continues to rebuild its image after a questionable number of declining years.

When I was a kid, Troy was the next biggest city to where my grandmother lived – in Hoosick Falls (which says something about Hoosick Falls), so whenever we were visiting she would take us on the bus to visit the downtown area. I don’t remember much of those trips, other than going over a big bridge and possibly shopping at the Carl Company. Since then, I’ve had a nostalgic fondness for the home of Uncle Sam.

The Trojan Renaissance continues on every last Friday of the month, when Troy Night Out features art exhibits and live performances at the restaurant and shops in the downtown vicinity. These nights are a fun time to get out and see what the city’s like at its most vibrant and active. Now that the weather is getting nice again they’re the perfect times to stroll the streets and see what Troy has to offer.

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Flash Me Anytime

My teary-eyed love for a flash mob has already been documented here, but here’s a bit of an addendum, spurred by this video of a ‘Lion King’ cast setting the take-off scene in an airplane. Everyone wishes they were on a flight like this, and once again I teared up a bit watching it unfold, as often happens when people spontaneously burst into song.

Most of us, myself included, reach a certain state of complacent ennui as we age, a sort of stagnant and sad plateau of steady-as-she-goes. We succumb to a bit of ‘There is nothing new under the sun’ syndrome. I don’t believe in that. I like ripples and dips and ravines with ravishing drop-offs. So when something like this comes along to beautifully upset the status-quo, even in the hum-drum exercise of a plane take-off, I take notice and smile.

Those moments when we are jolted awake are what inspire me. That’s what a flash mob or unexpected round of singing does. And as touching as it is to see a group of people joining together to make strangers smile, it is the smiles on those who get to witness the event that are just as moving. That is the ultimate human experience for me – strangers making each other smile. I’m not good at that, but my closest friends are. People like Skip and Suzie, who care just as much for their fellow human beings as they do for themselves. There’s a grace and generosity of spirit that they have, and which I most often lack, so from them I try to learn to be better. Watching a moment like this restores a little bit of my faith in humanity. It reminds me that things aren’t as bad as they sometimes seem.

There is more to see than can ever be seen,
More to do than can ever be done…
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David Beckham In His Budgie Smugglers

Quite frankly, I’m not sure what took David Beckham so long to offer his own version of the Speedo, or Budgie Smuggler, but here it is, as part of his H&M line of swimwear. My first reaction, even at the sight of his bulge in white shiny brief-like swimsuit, is largely lackluster. Like his H&M underwear line, the style, the color, and the fit are all unimpressive. In fact, the last style, with the dull color-blocking mishap, is dismal at best. I much prefer Beckham’s work with Emporio Armani – it was classic but daring, elegant but edgy, and much sexier than anything H&M has produced thus far.

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Rubbing One Out, or In

Oh my God, I thought as I turned my hands over in themselves, rubbing lotion into the dry cracks of my knuckles, I’ve turned into Mrs. Loomis. She was my second grade teacher – one of my favorites – and I remember quite a few days of that school year. It was the year we each got a folder with our name on it, one we would keep until the last day of school.

In a method that would likely be unthinkable in today’s overly-egalitarian coddling of children, those students who completed a perfect day of school work would receive a sticker for our personalized folders. At the end of the year, the student with the most stickers would get to pick from a pile of prizes, and so on down the line until everyone got one. I guess in a way it was kind of cruel, but only if you were one of the dumb kids. Well, scholastically-challenged. Oh fuck it, dumb. This blog isn’t going to win any child-friendly awards any time soon.

But I digress… back to the lotion at hand. Or on hand. I use it sparingly now, remembering a certain day when Mrs. Loomis made the mistake of squeezing out more than she needed. She often sat at her desk while we were working, twisting her hands and fingers around each other after procuring a small amount of lotion from her container of Vaseline. I watched with keen interest this magic ritual. She didn’t even take her rings off to do it. One day she absent-mindedly squirted too much into her palm. She looked up and asked the class if anyone wanted some. A few girls stood up and got in line, and a boy or two. (I was not one of them.) She took a little bit from the excess on her hand and put some on each child’s hand until she had a manageable amount left. The kids acted like little adults, rubbing it in as they returned to their desks. One of the kids, Sammy, was notoriously ill-behaved. I had no tolerance for such nonsense, so he was never one of my favorites, but he stood in line, much to my amused surprise. He got his little dollop of lotion and swirled it around in his hands. My heart softened a little at that moment. I wondered if he lived in a home bereft of the luxury of lotion. I wondered what else his home might not have that mine did, and that I’d always taken for granted. While I’d never been outwardly mean (I was actually frightened of him), inwardly I became a little nicer, unsure if such an internal change made any difference at all.

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A Statue Stands in the Public Garden

This particular statue holds a special place in my heart, as it stands sentinel in front of the patch of green where Andy and I were married. At this time of the year, it’s still too soon to be surrounded by much life, but soon – very soon – it will be backed by a trio of pink Kwanzan cherries, the chartreuse strands of weeping willows, and a majestic Metasequoia. The duck-and-swan-filled pond will return to squawking activity, and the foot-bridge will carry pedestrians from flowering tree to flowering tree. It will return. It always does.

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Hiding Under the Table

Family friends Elaine and Tony are due to see our new kitchen for the first time since returning from Florida a couple of weeks ago. They are always a bright presence in our lives, and especially in our home. Since they head down to Florida for the winter, if they’re here it means that spring and summer are on the way. This Saturday we’ll be hosting them and my parents, and I can’t wait.

I can almost smell the blown-out candles now. That’s always been the scent of happiness – signifying the end of a special meal with family or friends. As a child, it meant we just had an event that merited candle-light and dining-room settings. The kitchen would be filled with the bustling of dishes being rinsed and loaded, and the banter and laughter of family. My brother and I would spy from other rooms, darker rooms where we could disappear as kids, watching and playing and avoiding the adults as much as we were fascinated by them.

To this day, the smell of a blown-out candle inspires a giddy little thrill. Mostly, it reminds me of my Uncle Roberto, who would often be present at those rare evenings when we brought out the fine china and assembled in the formal dining room. (Usually we ate around the small kitchen table.) Dinner was a chance to listen in to adult talk, and to occasionally hear a conversation in Tagalog – a rare treat for us – but really it was just a waiting period before slipping under the table and ultimately escaping between the cherry legs of chairs. Sometimes we thought the adults didn’t notice us, sometimes we knew they did, sometimes we’d get yelled at, and sometimes we got out without reprimand. It was a tenuous, tacit agreement between us kids and the adults, strained at times, but not wholly without fun and childish amusement.

These days we have a different kind of fun, and my niece and nephew are the ones who hide under the table. I’m the adult Uncle, more concerned with grown-up conversation than disappearing into the imagined world of a kid, but every now and then I’ll excuse myself, answering the pleas of Noah or Emi to play chase, and suddenly I’ll be back three decades ago.

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An Almost-Full-Frontal Shoot to Appease

All right, apologies for that awful April Fool’s joke in the previous post. To make up for it, here’s a practically-full-frontal look at my junk (which most people have seen through careful perusing of the Archives here anyway.) What a difference a few cotton fibers make, but what is the real difference anyway? Long have I battled with the notion of exposure, over-exposure, and under-exposure, but why does it really matter? We’re all born naked, and underneath our clothes we’re all still naked. Deal with it.

From the moment I mooned a car at the Dan Dee Donuts as a seven-year-old (to the horror and amusement of my brother) I’ve never had a hang-up with nudity. Clearly, that continues to this day, even if the moonings go worldwide.

 

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Finally, A Full-Frontal Shot

Some of you have been waiting a very long time for this, and since it’s spring and I’m feeling generous, let’s just do it and get it over with. Like some pesky albatross of virginity, I’ve actually popped my full-frontal cherry years ago, but most of you weren’t around to witness the explosion. This time around a few more people are watching, so without further ado, here’s the big reveal:

Well, first a little teasing. Beating around the proverbial bush, so to speak…

And now to the full-frontal assault on your senses

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Baby it ain’t over til it’s over…

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Over and over

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Wait, you didn’t think it would be my full-frontal shot, did you?

Happy First of April, suckas!

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Harry Judd, Naked For Real

In celebration of Attitude’s 20th Anniversary, Harry Judd gets naked for their cover, and it’s a doozy of a photo spread, so to speak. Mr. Judd has been nude here before, and no one complained then, so here he is again. That ass just won’t quit.

Previous Harry Judd Posts:

First Hunk of the Day Appearance

Second Hunk of the Day Crowning

Attitude Briefs Cover

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A Message Directly from Madonna

“Laughing at all the haters out there who spend their energy trying to limit and label me with their prejudices and fears! Take your evil tongue and eye and turn them into birds that fly! Don’t waste precious time. Spend it on things you love!” ~ Madonna

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Out Like A Lamb: A Recap

The time has come for March to depart, and not a moment too soon. This is not a complaint – March has been, for the most part, pretty damn good to me, laying the groundwork for some major changes – mostly good – to kick-start the rest of this spring. More on that a little later. For now, this recap of the eventful last week of the month that came in like a lion and will hopefully exit as softly as a lamb.

We started off with a few Cocks in Socks. Will there be a Part 2 with my own junk front and center? Wait & see…

It turned out that everyone has a ‘Punky Brewster’ memory.

A British ass menagerie featuring Ben Cohen, Harry Judd, and Tom Daley.

Waking up with a woody.

I’m just a jeans-and-t-shirt kind of guy. NOT.

Say a little prayer. Or a lot of them

Our shirtless American hero, prepping for the Winter Festival.

This woman brings out the beast in me.

A pair of birthdays on the same day ~ here and here.

Some were like lions, some were like lambs – all were hunky, including Kevin Selby, Mahershala Ali, Olly Barkley, Kirill Dowidoff, Adam Coussins, and Lenny Kravitz.

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