Logo Madness

If you haven't noticed yet, the blog has a new temporary logo which will be up until Valentine's Day.

In a fit of creativity, I had created a bunch of new logos for No Milk Please which I intend to put up during the holidays and maybe when I'm feeling bored with the standard logo. But I'm impatient and I don't think I can wait a whole year to unfold these, so I decided to post them now as a little preview.

Seasonal







Non-seasonal





Some of them will be up for only a day, others I may keep for the duration of the holiday. I haven't decided what to do about the non-seasonal ones. I thought they were cute, but I can't really have a different logo every week. I thought they were fun to make though.

If you have any concepts you can think of, put them in the comments. Maybe I'll be inspired by them. I think I've exhausted all the evil cow/poisoned dairy themes. You can also send me pics that could be interesting to make into a logo.

If you want to try your hand at a No Milk Please logo, please feel free to send them to me, maybe we could get a contest going. Winner gets to do my laundry.

Also, if you haven't visited the Sidebar lately, this past weekend, I have re-designed the template so that it was more cohesive with the main site. :)

Happy New Year

Overheard on January 1st, 2008, about 1:30 a.m., on a snowy street corner on Ontario and Orleans.

Woman in stilettos, a silver sequined dress and a black overcoat to the occupant of a cab pulling away from curb:

"That was my cab you bitch, I was here first! HAPPY FUCKING NEW YEAR!"

Merry Christmas

Mind Control

I do have super powers! This year I was able to convince my boyfriend, my friends and family that the most important thing this holiday season was that we share good times together, instead of spending our money on gifts.

Since October I had been focusing all my mental abilities on my friends and family to bend them to my will. Sure, it took a lot of time, skill and effort to collect enough blackmail material to control their minds but it worked! I am buying absolutely no presents this year. None!

It's like a domino effect: no presents means no last minute shopping, no last minute gift wrapping and no last minute visit to my shrink. Black Friday? I spent it at home watching porn. Cyber Monday? Ditto. If everybody doesn't somehow break free of my mind control, 2008 may be the first year that begins with no crushing holiday debt...

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Holiday posts from the archives:

Holiday Mixtape - Cheese rules in the holidays. Pretend Holiday - Remembering the true pronounciation of Hanukkah and Christmas.

Merry War (Christmas Is Over) - The depression that comes after the holidays. Baby's First Christmas - Jordan's nephew Justin becomes a mouthpiece for his disgruntled aunt.

Merry War (Christmas is Over)

The presents have been opened and returned; the holiday cheer from the prescription medication has faded; the deep resentments have been put back in storage, nestled among the fragile Christmas ornaments, ready to be unearthed at the next holiday gathering.

Another year over; a new one's just begun.

I guess it's safe for me to come out say it: I hate Christmas. I never used to hate Christmas though, probably because I never used to have to shop for anyone. That's because until I was about 23, my family and I never used to exchange gifts. My parents, in their infinite wisdom and stinginess, decreed that nobody got gifts. Ok my parents weren't really stingy, they were just very very cheap.

It's really quite an amazing thing really, because the gifts that I do receive from my family are totally unexpected and require no reciprocation. I remember a few years ago when my brother Peter who had just gotten a TiVo, enjoyed it so much that he bought me one too. He presented it to me unwrapped and unadorned one cool September.

Nobody got Game Boys, but nobody got ugly ties, macaroni art or yet another coffee mug either. Because of this, my family never gave or got gifts to each other for any holiday, birthday or graduation from modeling school/diploma mill, a situation that continues to this day, thirty-odd years later.

I should say, this situation continues to this day back home.

Here in Chicago, I am swept into this tsunami we call Christmas. I never realized how good I got it until I was standing in the middle of the Mall of Destruction. The only thing that kept me sane this past season was my mantra, which I repeated over and over as I fought through the crowds and waited in line: "Prepare to die, you motherfucker."

If you asked me what is the biggest threat facing the world today, I would say it is the Gift Exchange. That and knee-length tube socks, but I digress. Gift exchanges are tearing down the fabric of our family and our friends--the ones that we still speak to after the holidays.

Oh, don't try to defend it. For every gift you got that you begged Santa for, there is a landfill of stuff with your name on the gift tags--in a landfill.

I have spent the last two weeks before Christmas running around trying to buy the perfect gift for my friends; the gift that is the symbol of our friendship, my understanding of their spirit, my wish for their future happiness. There is only one caveat: you cannot give them the only gift that could possibly fit the bill: warm, soft money.

That would be crass. Ironic that it's inappropriate for all this crass commercialism.

And after all that, people judge you. They judge you for the gifts you give them. They think about how much they spent in relation to what they received and they judge you for not reading their minds. Even worse, they judge you for your excessive use of tape to wrap the gifts.

Can you imagine the First Christmas? Remember when the Three Kings bore gifts to the Child in the manger? Can you imagine what the guy who brought the myrrh must've thought when Mary opened the other guys' presents and it was silver and gold? Can you imagine him pulling the other two aside, hissing angrily, "I thought we agreed on a 20 chicken limit! That must've cost at least a goat and a dairy cow!"

Imagine his embarrassment when Mary said, "Myrrh... and oh, frankincense? That's... nice." and surreptitiously looked for a gift receipt? Can you imagine the hassle of traveling by donkey 200 miles to the bazaar and only managing a bazaar credit?

Christmas has come and gone. Saddam is dead. The world is still the same.

The war is still the same.

This past Christmas, I watched WWE's Tribute to The Troops: Christmas in Baghdad. John Cena, The Undertaker and CM Punk pummeled each other, bounced around the ropes and pumped their fists in the air. The troops cheered for them.

I cheered too.

I cheered for these combatants in tights, prancing in the ring, these fighters in a false war.

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The Long Way Home - Twelve posts about my incredibly interesting family and my remarkably sane relationship with them. Mistaken Identity - Switching identities with my twin brother Peter: a desperate fantasy.

...and a happy new year - A phone call to my father where we grunt, hem and haw. Catalyst - When Al Gore lost to Dubya, all I was worried about was Gay Marriage. Little did I know.

Pretend Holiday

"Hanukkah is a minor holiday," proclaimed Mark, my colleague at work.

Mark is Jewish. I, of course, am a Gentile. Especially my hands, since I use premium hand lotion.

"It's not a holiday where you have change your behavior," he continued. "You don't have to fast, refrain from working or anything. Hanukkah has been 'elevated' to the level of a major shopping holiday, like Christmas."

"Shopping, of course, being the operative word," I finished for him. "It's the time when we can all give each other Pieces of designer Earthenware."

He nodded, "It's all crass commercialization! The true meaning of the holidays has been lost."

Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, these holidays have been elevated to this frenzied level by the retailers. It won't be long before they have a menorah with 14 branches because we need more shopping days.

Even Christmas, now celebrated from Labor Day through the very last after-after-after-holiday markdown sale, has its origins from pagan rituals. Christmas still bears its pagan symbols: the tree, the star, the disco ball ornament.

I mean, Jesus wasn't even born in December, couldn't you tell? He had a tan for hissakes. Jesus would never have a fake-n-bake, that would be lying, a sin! I think we should pass a law that prohibits the people with fake tans from getting married, coz it threatens the sanctity of marriage.

I think that to be a major holiday, there must be sacrifice, there must be bloodshed, lots of it: Thanksgiving, the massacre; Easter, the Mel Gibson version; Valentine's Day, that time when your late boyfriend forgot to get you a gift. Christmas--it's just a pretend-holiday.

"How do you spell Hanukkah," I asked, thinking about how to blog this conversation.

"Most people spell it 'Hanukkah,' I think. Some people spell it like 'Chanukah'," he said. "It's pronounced 'Cha-nu-kah'."

He said the first syllable 'cha' as if he was calling me an 'asshole' behind a cough.

I repeated it after him.

"No, no, no, more phlegm. Say it as if you were going to hawk a loogie," he advised.

Ok, everyone, here it goes:

"Hhhcchhhappy Hhhcchanukkah, and a very merry Hhhcchristmas to you all!"

(and don't forget the true holy day behind the pretend one)

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Other holiday posts:

Baby's First Christmas - Jordan's nephew Justin becomes a mouthpiece for his disgruntled aunt. Red Envelopes - Learn the ancient Chinese tradition of gift-giving for the holidays.

Appetite - In my first Christmas nativity pageant, I played a cow when I should've been Mary. Brokeback Mountain - Hey since there is a picture of Jake, you might as well read about that gay movie he was in.

Happy Birthday To Me

These are ten presents I gave myself today:

1. Squeezing the toothpaste from the middle of the tube.

2. Not cleaning the litterbox.

3. Not throwing out the garbage.

4. Not shaving. My legs.

5. Wearing jeans to work (because I can).

6. Coming half an hour late to work.

7. Not returning any phone calls.

8. Ignoring the jammed copier.

9. Reading your blog.

10. Leaving half an hour early from work.

Technorati Tags: Humor Gay Queer

Baby's First Christmas

When a baby gets born into a family, it’s a wondrous event. It brings a sense of hope that maybe somehow, this generation will be the one to first to go to college, become a professional, learn to put the toilet seat down.

I spent this past Christmas at my friend Jordan's home, who recently became an uncle. It was the first Christmas for his nephew, the 5-month old Justin, the first grandchild in the household. Everyone was ga-ga over this baby, of course, as is expected since this family has a history of mental illness.

Everyone went overboard with the gifts, stuff that the baby wouldn’t use for years to come: books, toys, a crack pipe. People laughed when they opened the box of condoms I ‘gave’ the baby, jovially slapping me on the back, winking and elbowing me. I realized then that I switched the gift tags by mistake; the condoms were for the parents.

Deanna, one of little baby Justin’s aunts, was quite taken with the him. She couldn’t keep her hands off the little tyke. She was cooing at it and making noises. But then, she started having one-way conversations with it.

At first, she was just talking nonsense, repeating the same phrases over and over, in a girlish, high-pitched voice designed to irritate the baby into responding.

Aren’t you cuuute? Yoou’re sooo cuuute! Koochy-koochy-koo! Does that tickle? Oooh, that tickles, doesn’t it? That’s so adorable and cuuuuuute!

Then it seemed that Deanna was using the baby to send messages to anybody within earshot, like his parents.

I hope you liked that car seat we got you for Christmas. It must be very comfortable and safe for little babies like youuu! I spent lot of time looking for just the right one! And I didn’t even think of the priiiice! I wanted your mom and dad to know I got you juuuust the right one!

Then it really got weird.

I hope you grow up biiiig and stroooong and smaaaart, unlike my boyfriend Carl who can’t hold down a job or pay me back that $300 he owes me. You have such as cuuute smile, just like your dad, who would’ve married me if my little sister, your mother, didn’t screw him and gotten pregnant with you...

Even though I was just a guest, I decided to intervene by relieving Deanna of the loveable little load. As I rocked the baby to sleep in my arms, I felt something overcome me, a maternal instinct maybe, which felt like my balls shrinking and rising and trying to stuff themselves back into my body cavity, trying to fold themselves into a vagina.

As I gave little Justin a kiss on the forehead, I saw Deanna playing with the chihuahua Twinkie, his little face in her hands, their noses almost touching...

You’re such a pretty dog aren’t you, Twinkeeee, arentchooo? You wouldn’t pass off a cheap-ass ugly plastic salad bowl as a real gift when everybody knows you got it from your Secret Santa at work...sooo cuuute!

Red Envelopes

Don't be shocked by this revelation: until I was twenty-three years old, I have never, ever received a Christmas present from my parents or my siblings. The closest I got to a Christmas present was when I was fourteen, my dad gave me a girlie calendar he got from the auto parts company he did business with that year, still gift-wrapped. I think he was trying to teach his queer boy something, you know, like maybe how to straddle a five foot long spark plug in a bikini and red, stiletto heels.

No, my parents are not horrible or stingy. Quite the opposite: they would help you up if you slip and fall; politely laugh at your lame jokes; sue your ass when you rear-end them. They're real salt-of-the-earth kinda people. They don't put on false airs--they own up to their farts, even the real stinky burrito ones.

I grew up in a Third World country. To my traditional Asian parents, Christmas gift-giving is much a western concept, like "tipping," "driving in your own lane" or even "getting an allowance." For a little pocket money, we kids had to get straight A's, do household chores and assemble a few hundred garments for export to the USA.

Still, we had it good. On a good day, I made 70 cents. And at least we worked for a major designer label like Kathie Lee Gifford, sold exclusively at Walmart. The Cruz girls from down the street always looked enviously as we walked past them on our way to the sweatshop; they had to glue on plastic "Proda" labels on ersatz leather goods (tacky!). Oh, how I felt sorry for them.

My parents, born to Chinese immigrants, subscribed more to the tradition of giving "red envelopes" or ang pao during special occasions like birthdays, graduation, your first prostitute. Christmas, though not a Chinese tradition, fell into this category. My grandparents, aunts and uncles would visit our house and present us with red envelopes containing small bills.

My mother, who wanted to teach us the value of money, would tell us that we could go spend it on toys now or save it for our education. She would tell us, "if you go to college, you make enough to have nice crib, have Cris in the fridge, maybe some nice bling."

I guess when she put that way, it made sense. I handed over my ang pao to her and she put it in my Hello Kitty savings account. Years later, I used my Hello Kitty savings to move away to Chicago.

I know that many people think that money or gift cards are a such a thoughtless gift to give, but I really think otherwise. What could be better than giving somebody the power to buy whatever they want?

But you know, sometimes I get really excited when I open a carefully wrapped gift and find a gift receipt taped inside the box. The bulky reindeer sweater inside was a really thoughtful gift--for someone else.

Also, people always think that they know you better than they actually do. I mean, I mention one day that I thought that pez dispensers are cute, next thing I know, I have a shelf full of pez collectibles. I don't even like pez candy! Maybe one day I will casually mention that I think giant buttplugs are cute and see what happens.

After I moved to Chicago, I have gotten more into the holiday spirit of maxing out my credit cards. I spent last weekend driving around looking for a parking space and standing in lines, just to get that very special gift that says "I hope you enjoy this thoughtful gift because I will be filing for bankruptcy next year."

But even though my family and I never exchanged gifts on Christmas, I never felt that was missing anything. The money filled the emptiness in my heart. And I never thought about it before, but I really think that I enjoyed the holiday season more.

These days, I am not sure how much time I am going to have to feel any peace-on-earth and goodwill-towards-men; I still have a lot of shopping to do.