Vallay-hos

As I mentioned yesterday, while camping up in Guerneville, we met some boys from Vallejo and witnessed firsthand the tragedy of bridge-and-tunnel gays.

Now, I don't mean to come off as a condescending or elitist panda, but these characters were like none other that I've ever met and our groups couldn't be more dissimilar. Even one of the Vallejo boys commented on how different "city gays" were from the people he tended to interact with, but more on that later.

I guess it started on the river, where we were laughing and merry-making while buoyed by an inflatable mattress. Two skinny twenty-somethings were paddling rafts around and having fun in the sun, occasionally connecting to our raft and making small-talk with us.

At one point, Blanca pushed Beetle off the raft and Beetle's sunglasses were lost in the murky river waters. Yelling ensued. Blame was cast. Threats of full-priced drinks were made.

Fortunately, one of the Vallejo boys helped to avoid WWIII by finding the sunglasses with his prehensile toes! Beetle was incredibly grateful and thanked the lad, thus including him in our little coterie.

Mattress had returned to camp with a Mexican feast, which he laid out on our picnic table. Mahogany Sparkle, Mattress and I were merrily noshing while we waited for the others to arrived, when one Vallejo boy arrived and lingered by us.

In short order, we learned that ...

* He broke up with his boyfriend (whom he had known for two months) the previous night and kicked him out of camp before hitting the bars and losing his cell phone.
* He had been "in trouble" a year-and-a-half ago and spent two months in prison, taking the fall for his drug-dealing ex-boyfriend. Consequently, he faced weekly drug testing on Thursdays.
* He thought Blanca was cute, but felt that "city gays" acted more feminine than gays in Vallejo.
* In Vallejo, most gays were "straight-acting, wannabe gangsters" who wore baggy clothes and postured as gang members.
* He was not camping with friends, but instead was in the company of "associates."

Meanwhile, Mahogany Sparkle was muttering under his breath, rolling his eyes and watching as the boy from Vallejo continued to adjust himself inside and outside of his shorts. Eventually, the boy ate some of our food, offered some of his vodka, then returned to his "associates."

Later, when Mahogany Sparkle and I were enjoying the sun and some conversation about celebrities or something equally important, Vallejo boy's "associate" arrived and said, "Can I ask you a question?"

"Sure," I replied.

"How many times during a day do you guys laugh?" he asked.

"Huh?" I asked, not sure I had heard him correctly.

"How many times a day do you laugh?" he repeated.

Unsure of the true answer, I threw out the number 5,000. Mahogany Sparkle said he laughed a lot, partly because he thought it was a good workout for one's abdominals.

This response made the Vallejo associate laugh and, lifting up his tank top, giggled, "me too!" In doing so, he revealed a rash of ingrown hairs and razor burn, which made Mahogany Sparkle roll his eyes and mumble, "this ho..."

As he walked away, I asked why he was interested in the number of times we laughed daily and he responded, "Oh, it's just that I know a lot of people who don't laugh very much."

I am so not moving to Vallejo.