Lonnie Giles, the new Executive Director of Agliff, who has replace festival founder Scott Dinger, set me up with press passes for the festival. We e-mailed each other a couple times last month and then I forgot all about it.

My family evacuated Houston for Hurricane Rita last weekend and 11 relatives ended up in Austin to visit. For a little while, I thought they were going to all end up staying with me in my one bedroom apartment, but my niece got on the phone and called about 30 motels and finally found a 2 bedroom suite at a Holiday Inn, so only 4 people stayed with me. After two sleepless nights wondering why they were and if they were safe while they were stuck for 40 hours on the freeway leading out of town, I slept on the floor for four nights while they visited. I bring all this up because, all this drama and restlessness occurred just 3 days before the festival began.

It was Thursday night before I went to Tapelenders to pick up my badge and ticket for the fest. The festival utilizes part of the space in the gay-themed video and novelty store's basement, where the DVD's for rent are shelved, as their ticketing center pre-fest. This space has increasingly become too small as the years have went on and they really need to consider coming up with a better place and a better system.

The volunteers doing the ticketing were a frazzled mess. A cluster-fuck in inadequacy and ignorance. One of them even wondered aloud where everyone had been the previous three days, since, judging by the long line, everyone was here now, like me, trying to get set up for the fest.

Well, they hadn't. The line was even longer and it wasn't moving. I saw Ryan Cox, Austin filmmaker and a film programmer for Agliff, standing in back of me and waved hello. The volunteers were even more confused now and no one in line knew what in the hell was going on. A lot of people were waiting to the side and some people seemed to be skipping ahead of them. I stood under some horrid track lighting and called my numero uno gal-pal Johnny Oh! We chatted and I kevetched about the cluster-fuck going on. The lighting was blinding all of us and I quipped that "With all these gay men around, someone should be able to get this track light out of our eyes!"

As I was leaving, I saw Ryan and we chatted a bit. He introduced me to his cute female friend Collier (French for "necklace") and told me his short, a musical he was filming last time I talked to him, was playing in the festival before a documentary about Morrissey fans. His short is called "Santa Ana" and he told me, "It's not gay." It's set in the desert and he hoped to film it in West Texas but he ended up having to lens it in Wimberley.

After work, I went home and chilled for a bit before heading to the Arbor. It was so crowded, I decided to park in grass and called Johnny Oh! and told him to park there, thinking if so many people followed suit, we might not get towed. (We didn't). Johnny arrived a bit later and did so. While I waited for him I took some pictures of the area for the opening night party. Agliff used to rent out a space for this event (when it used to be held at The Paramount) but now they just have it in the Arbor parking lot in a semi-roped off area. I also took a picture of van that promoed Front Gate Ticketing which seemed to help the fest with some on-line ticketing stuff this year.

Since I have a badge and Johnny is laying low this year (he usually buys a membership), I got in the badge line and said I would save him a seat. The lines were another cluster-fuck as no one knew what was going on and different volunteers said different things and no one knew what in the hell was going on. The lines at the will-call table were an even bigger mess and the Arbor looked like a Hurricane relief center. You think FEMA was disorganized! You shoulda been at Agliff at opening night! I saw Bruce Weatherford, the Agliff IT guy behind the counter trying to help. And I saw some young hottie that could have been Johnny Oh's little brother. Other than that, there didn't seem to be a cute guy in sight. Where are all the little hottie boy volunteers?

I got in line at 7:05 but it was 7:25 before they began to let the badges people in to the theater. (Johnny had quipped that it would be 8 before the 7:30 scheduled film started - it was 8:15). On the way in I saw Scott Dinger and said hello. Scott, who is usually running around like crazy on opening night seemed quite relaxed. It was probably the first Agliff opening night he was able to sit back and enjoy ever. I told him he looked relaxed and wondered if they had called him 8 times today for help. He was nice and positive and said they hadn't called him at all. (They should have! They needed a lot of help!)

In the theater, there were some weird things show including music videos (MC900ft Jesus? Seether? At least it wasn't Diva music). They also showed a preview for "29th and Gay" which was about some 40-year-old, balding, loser suddenly finding love with a 17 year old sensitive college kid or some such nonsense. Then there was a clip from Tom Hanks' "Bachelor Party" which was duly noted in on-screen text as "homophobic" before we reminded that Hanks would star in "Philadelphia" nine years later.

There were some people sitting next to me and when they saw me taking notes they asked me if I was writing about the festival. I said I was and they asked me to mention the "cute lesbian named Shannon" who was sitting next to me and say that she was "good in bed." I don't know about that but I do know that someone in her group kept whipping out her lighted cell phone during the movie and waving it about in a distracting manner and they also did a little talking. Fucking lesbians. They show a lesbian movie on the other side of the theater for opening night. (This year it was "Fingersmith," a film that was already for rent on DVD and positioned notably on a shelf right next to the Agliff table at Tapelenders, much to Agliff Film Programmer Mo Ratel's chagrin, I am sure). I guess that's why these girls were in "our" film. Lesbians have a whole different way of viewing films different from gay men. They are loud, rambunctious and totally insensitive. You know... As a generality.

Suddenly two short films were shown. "Gay Life for Beginners," a funny, cute short using CGI effects humorous against a pink background to discuss gay sexuality. And a music video of classic gay moments in movies set to The Pointer Sisters' "I'm So Exited." Both of them were made by someone named Annabelle Wick.

A lot of people were surprised when the lights came back up but I knew a 20 minute introduction was coming. They always introduce the Board of Directors (aka glorified volunteers) before the first film (and the last... it goes on and on). Jenn Garrison, who was on this year's "MTV's The Real World: Austin" and who is the "President" of the board got up and introduced the group around her including Bruce Weatherford, one of the only board members to return from last year (Dinger and Sandra Martinez and Bobette are all gone). Jenn introduced Lonnie Giles, who talked incessantly about Director's Parties going on this week (all I know is I wasn't invited). Lonnie introduced Mo who introduced filmmaker Craig Chester who gave a little introduction.

After all of this, we had to wait for the film to start because the group went over to the second theater (the men need two houses, there are so many attending) and make the same introductions. Johnny had bought a big tub of popcorn and a Coke so we munched and chatted while we waited for the film to start.

I met up with Johnny and we ate and drank while we chatted and saw the band they had hired to play. There's a cute fem violinist named Omar who plays here in town and I've seen him about three times. The first time he played solo and wasn't very good but he has gotten much better over the past few years and, back with a full jazz rock band, he was awesome. They even played "I Will Survive" towards the end of the evening and people danced.

Johnny and I people watched and there were a lot of cute hustlers and young guys there. I think Agliff tells their big, rich clients, called "Producers," who are mainly a bunch of fat old trolls, to bring their boytoy hustlers and their boytoy hustler's friends to the party. (I am probably not getting invited back next year now).

I saw Bruce and said hello. I got Johnny to take our picture together. I've liked Bruce ever since he introduced me to filmmaker James Bolton, ("Eban and Charley,") ("The Graffiti Artist") a few years ago. I saw Ryan but didn't get a chance to talk to him). I also saw SXSW Producer Matt Dentler there, which was a shocker. He must have been checking out the festival. He can't possibly be gay, can he? He was smoking a cigarette like he was pretty nervous so... Well, that still could make it go either way.

I ran into my friend Liz Lopez who writes a lot for Hispanic newspapers here in town. We saw filmmaker Craig Chester and I went over and said Hello and got my picture taken with him. By now I was a little tipsy and when I asked people to take pictures with them, I told them I was a "media slut." I also got my picture taken with Mo Ratel.

By far, the highlight of the night, besides all the cute young men about, was meeting Anastasia, Jenn Garrison's "gal- pal." (I got my picture taken with them too). Anastasia was hilarious and funny and beautiful. She overheard me talking about being bitter and she laughed so heartily at all of my jokes and my "bitter old queen" routines. I fell in love! We talked about all sorts of stuff (i.e. Lodgey too tipsy too remember most of it). One thing I do remember is she said this great phrase: "A real boner kill." Isn't that a great name for a band?!? Boner Kill. I love it.

Also, she told me about this great thing Oprah said, supposedly in some show about teaching young women not to be sluts. "Don't give away the pretty." Sounds kinda like Oprah believe women should be whores and not sluts. Still, I've paraphrased that for my official slogan now: Don't give away the Bitter!

Anastasia was so great. I hope I get to see her some more.

I am looking forward to the festival this year. It's always great to hang around with a bunch of gay people and Agliff is the one time a year where a movie buff like me can really feel comfortable in my element. Seeing movies and talking about them with other gay people. It's a joy to not have to explain to some straight reviewer that a film was "watchable" because some hot guy was the star.

I am among my brothers and sisters!

Don't give away the bitter!

Lodger2005