FESTIVAL, SCHMESTIVAL

I live in Allentown. Heading into the weekend, friends, co-workers, and even just acquaintances keep saying things like “Hey, we’ll stop by your house during the Allentown Art Festival,” in effect just inviting themselves over and creating a party where one was not planned.

I hate the Art Festival and I hate parties. Can I just hide and pretend not to be home, or would that be like refusing to answer the door for trick-or-treaters on Halloween, and worthy of my house being egged or my front lawn being toilet-papered?

—Artless Dodger

Ruthless says: Hang a note on your door proclaiming the sudden onset of Mono, scabies, pink-eye, and symptoms of Turrets syndrome. Or get someone to throw up and/or urinate on your front steps. That shouldn’t be too difficult during the Art Festival. Just walk over to the Pink Flamingo, and grab the guy furthest from the door.

The Straight Skinny: There are “festival people” and “non-festival people,” and you clearly belong to the latter group. What festival people don’t understand about their counterparts is how anybody could not enjoy swarms of people, crowded streets, and stifling heat (or blistering cold, in the case of St. Patrick’s Day, which vies with the Art Festival for worst day ever for Allentowners). These people love the energy and the excitement of street festivals, they love to watch the scantily clad, overly tanned, in- or out-of-shape bodies inching down the street, wedged together like shuffling sardines (and looking just as greasy, too).

Naturally, festival people want to share this experience with their friends, and they even take statements such as “I’d rather swallow razor blades than attend” such-and-such event as calls for help, and they’ll do anything to convince you that you really do want to go, even dropping by your house announced and literally dragging you with them. Beware the festival folk, and find another place to stay this weekend.

three’s company

I’ve heard before of “fag-hags”—women who only hang out with gay men—but what is the term for a man who has an abundance of lesbian friends?

—Odd Man Out

Ruthless says: I think the term is “delusional.” I picture a man with commitment issues, desperately in search of a threesome that’s never going to happen. Dream on, buddy, you’re not gonna turn them around…

The Practical Cogitator says: Social analysis abounds on the subject of women who love gay men. See John Malone’s groundbreaking book, Straight Women and Gay Men, in which he posits that gay men and women often share similar, cultivated interests such as theater, film (not movies), dance, and literature—in other words, activities that “real men” often pretend to disdain over fear of seeming effeminate. On the flip side, many lesbians are known to enjoy sports (and not just softball), drink beer, and can even change a flat tire or fix their own cars. Perhaps, in some instances, the same dynamic is at work?

The Straight Perspective: Dyke-y Mikeys?

Ask Anyone is local advice by and for local people. Please send your questions for our panel of experts to advice@artvoice.com.