Philip Weiss: The New M & The Old Observer

New York Observer, February 3, 2001 (click image to read)

Peter Kaplan cobbled together the new M mostly with existing staff from Fairchild.  I offered my services in a Starbucks near his office, "Pay me spit and I'll do anything you tell me to do.  I'll attack machine gun nests for you.  Only condition -- I report to you and not some hump who works for you." Maybe I came on a little strong.  Actually, I would work for one  hump who writes for Kaplan.  Philip Weiss.

Back in 2001, Kaplan was the editor of the NY Observer (Best Of NYO is in the sales bin here) back when that paper meant something more than real estate ads.  Kaplan not only hired Candace Bushnell but he came up with the title for her column, "Sex and the City."  I bet the NY Observer made a fortune off that.

Kaplan rounded out the new M crew with a few cronies from the Observer. One Observer alumni,  Philip Weiss, cranks out a gutsy interview with a difficult subject matter for any straight man... pretty boy model, Sean O'Pry (To Editors at GQ:  Worried about living down the, "Gay men's life style publication." Drop the cheese cake beards and hire Weiss).

I follow Weiss on Twitter  but back in the day, Weiss did an Observer interview with balls-so-big-I-don't-know-how-he-walks writer, Jim Harrison.  The premise for the interview was a discussion between Weiss and Harrison about older women. Harrison was always a hero of mine but Weiss became one too with this beautiful and honest piece about what it's like to be a man growing old and how it's possible to wake up and wise up.

If you're getting up there in the years - read this - you'll love it.  If you're a 25 year old Jr Mint -- I'm working on a Tumbler to explain this to you.  -30-

Pee Wee, Cowboy Curtis & Oeufs en Cocotte

Jambi: One pair of cowboy boots coming up! What size?

Cowboy Curtis: Uh, size 12, double E.

Pee-wee: Boy, big feet.

Cowboy Curtis: Well, ya know what they say.

Pee-wee: No. What?

Cowboy Curtis: For big feet, big boots!

I imagine most of you entitled snots were sitting on the floor in diapers with a piece of Zwieback sticking out of your drooling little mouth when this episode of Pee Wee's Playhouse aired back in November of 1986. I was in bed with a hangover and a woman old enough to be your mother. Not my mother. Your mother.

That's what some of your parents were doing in 1986. Laying in bed nursing hangovers and watching Pee Wee and Cowboy Curtis talk about wieners and big feet. I wonder how many obnoxious style bloggers were conceived during this episode? My spark was squeezed out while Jonathan Winters did 'Boys of Spring' on Jack Paar.



It's Saturday or Sunday morning. Hell, it can be Monday morning if you're highly evolved. You wake up with a throbbing head next to last night's first date. And lets say you wanna stay. It happens. You not only wanna stay...you want to make an impression. Especially if you didn't do so well last night. It happens...to you. Not to me.

Oeufs en Cocotte, my friend. It sounds (ee-noof en coe-kot) a helluva lot better than pancakes and bacon and it's a whole lot easier to make. Ask your host if they have any ramekins. Most women and all gay men have at least two. Four is better. Then tell them to go back to sleep.



If you find Stouffer's creamed spinach in the freezer then you're cooking with gas. That's an old expression, cooking with gas. You may be cooking with electric or, if you're Foster Huntington, with Sterno. Whatever, it's best to microwave the creamed spinach (4-5 minutes) then pour the whole bag into two (or four) ramekins. This is a real 'wing it' kind of recipe. No hard and fast rules. You can butter the ramekin or not. You can use herbs, onions, cheese, bacon, white truffle oil, tuna...anything you want although it helps if you use breakfasty stuff.


Crack one egg over whatever you placed in the bottom of the ramekin and place the ramekins in a sauce pan of boiling water. Mark Bittman leaves the boiling water out. Why? Because his cook books suck, that's why. You gotta have the boiling water step or, if you just stick the ramekins in an oven, you're gonna get oeufs en cocotte hard as a hockey puck. It happens...especially to Mark Bittman


Transfer the ramekins in boiling water to a 400 degree oven and set your timer for 8-10 minutes. The real luxury here is the softness of the eggs. Sexy is a good word. I recommend taking a tray of ramekins back to bed and presenting them to your new best friend, perhaps with a warm blowy whisper in their ear, "ee-noof en ko-kot." You can explain what cocotte means afterwards.

Was I Gay?

Gay at Nine (Chapel Hill, NC 1966)

The naked woman in the chocolate milk carton looked up at me from between my legs. Shoulder length brown hair bounced off her shoulders in perky flips. Dark eyes lined in powder blue eye liner matched the neglige laying at her knees. Long finger nails lacquered in silver polish and one hand with spread fingers across, "Gross!" said Victor, a fellow 4th grader at St Thomas More Catholic School.

Naked pictures of women were passed around in milk cartons under the table at lunch. Sister Jane and Sister Rose patrolled the boy-girl segregated tables in what was a lunch room/auditorium/ gym. Sister Rose, elderly and sweet, was the soft touch but Sister Jane, the school principal, was as mean as her habit. On a very hot day, I saw her without the coif and black veil. Her short shock of black hair reminds me of '80s punk but, it was 1966 and another shock of hair had my attention.

"That's disgusting," I told Victor. "I mean...is that for real?" I had seen pictures of breasts before but this was the first look south and it just didn't seem possible and certainly not natural. Alan Fox, in hipster black framed glasses too large for his face, leans toward me from across the lunch table, "You know those Hell's Angel guys...? I heard they actually... lick it." A chorus of disgust rises from what looks like a convention of nine year old photo copier salesmen in short sleeve white shirts and navy clip on ties. The camaraderie of shared nausea momentarily lowers our vigilance as I shake my head wildly while mouthing, "Nooooo Waaaayyyyy" and only stop when I feel an unfriendly hand on my shoulder.

My IBM comrades bury heads into lunch trays of fish sticks and mashed potatoes. The hand squeezes. I hunch my shoulders and wince -- More out of theater because my father did the same pinch but his was far more painful thanks to a childhood injury... He lost the feeling in his right hand and could put cigarettes out on his palm and not feel a thing.

It was Sister Jane... Why God? Why couldn't it have been Sister Rose? Sister Jane reaches between my legs and removes the milk carton and then me from the lunch table. Actually, I remember it as more of a jerk. If there was any punishment, I don't remember it and while Sister Jane and I would continue to have future clashes, this one, at least for me, is the most memorable. I'll always wonder how many of us at that lunch table became Hell's Angels.

Straight by 12 (from National Lampoon, February, 1974)

Dance Like The Go-Go's

Many thanks to Oyster Guy for mentioning this video in yesterday's comment section. Most people don't look at comments and that's a shame. If the post is the cake, then surely the comment section is the baking soda. I try and publish all comments. Even those accusing me of being gay. Which is impossible. At my age, every time I bend over the blood rushes to my head and I get so dizzy I almost fall over.

A Sweatshirt of a Certain Age

I've dragged this hooded sweat shirt around since 1985. I haven't been able to wear it since 1992. It's not that I've gained weight. I have. And like the weight I've packed on -- this sweatshirt is witness to years of change -- In myself and in my closet.

I wore this sweatshirt on a date in Philadelphia one night. Under a leather flight jacket with skin tight 501s and Timberland work boots. I complained to my date, later my wife, later my ex-wife, that I had been hit on by two gay men on my way to pick her up. She looked me up and down, arched an eyebrow and said, "Maybe it's the way you're dressing."

A lotta oxford has flowed through the closet since 1986. What I swore I would never wear: bow ties, double breasted blazers, suede shoes, club collars...not only reside in my closet but fit as well. My sweatshirt looks on. No longer worn. Not because it's too small, but because it isn't who I am anymore. A medium.

Georg Jensen Silver & My Gay Friends

Georg Jensen Bottle Opener

Perfect holiday gift for the black gay Jewish Republican on your list

Early last summer there was a Times piece about relationships between gay and straight men. Shortly after it ran, I was visiting college friends who commented about the number of gay friends I knew from school. It was late and as I stood up to leave I said, "Hey, don't knock my gay friends. It's the only time I get to play hard to get."

Back in the mid 80's, I'd complain to my girlfriend that the walk from my place to hers was impossible without getting hit on by gay men with little moustaches and tight fitting Izods. She made the observation that my tight fitting jeans, Timberland work boots, leather flight jacket and little moustache might have something to do with it. She was so observant I married her.

15 years later I was divorced and bidding on a piece of Georg Jensen silver when the auctioneer told me, "Sir, you're bidding against yourself." An expensive strategy but it was for the Golf Foxtrot and I had to have it. I ambled out of the auction house, Jensen pin in hand and walked east to Washington Square. It was a crisp autumn afternoon and I saw a sign for brunch outside an 18th century tavern.

The owner was an insane red head in her late 50's and she made the best bolognese. We talked and laughed and I showed her the pin while she poured my third glass of Umbrian red. She said she knew an antique's expert and if he came in she would point me out to him. She pointed and he knew a lot about silver. Enough to tell me I over paid. We talked about antiques and early 19th century portraits and he said, "Street's a hugely underrated artist. You have very good taste ... not that I'm flirting with you - - Well, maybe a little."

I turned to look at myself in the mirror behind the bar and thought, "Huh?" And it hit me. Staring straight ahead at the mirror I said, "You know, I'm sorry but I don't think I'm your type." He immediately called for his bill, signed it and left. I couldn't help but think, "Isn't that just like a man? Once he's figured out he's not getting in your pants, he's history."

When my father returned from Vietnam he was assigned to a National Guard unit in North Carolina and I had a friend who was black. Paul was not my first black friend but he was my first friend who was...lets call him effeminate. Odd because we were only 12. My parents taught me it was wrong to call people names based on ethnicity or religion but my father taught me you could be an asshole regardless of ethnicity or religion. He once said about an officer who had rumors following him --"I don't care if the man fucked Coke machines. He excelled at what he did on the battle field."

Paul was a good friend in a place that must have been a battle field for him. George Wallace stickers were as common as "We Reserve the Right to Serve" signs. Being black was tough enough. As an Army brat, I didn't have time to pick friends by their religion, sexual preference or politics. Consequently, some of my friends today are black gay Jewish Republicans and I wouldn't change a thing about them - - except that political party.