Brendan Fraser is at his most emotionally open in Rental Family (2025), giving a sensitive performance that's equal parts dopey and sweet, like a lovable Labrador. I couldn't take my eyes off him. Despite a mid-film montage intended to gloss over some script cuts, it felt like a worthwhile view.

Papi knows what’s up.

It’s a tree!

Conversations that remind me I’m fucking ancient: Me: Love the look. Very Saloon Gal with a Secret Heart of Gold. Drag Queen: Oh, thank you! Me: Like Angela Lansbury in Harvey Girls. But more feminine. Drag Queen: Anthea who now.

For the holidays I thought I'd track down a vintage '70s dessert recipe my mom used to make that, as a kid, I thought was wildly super-fancy because she didn't make it from cans or packets or encase it in Jello. Turns out it's made from Cool Whip, brownie mix, and instant coffee. So fancy. 🙄

Given that I've not watched Gilligan's Island since I was maybe ten, my shower can attest it is absolutely bonkers what an absolute and thorough recall I have of all the numbers from the castaways' musicalization of Hamlet.

With 31 Days of Dicks under my belt (albeit late) I want to thank all who participated with a little contest Whichever #Cocktober 🖼️ gets the most notes by end of Nov, I will do a feature of that model! Like and share your fav drawings, and check out the models pages to give them some love!

This month, we're headed over the rainbow! We invited the amazing @trannawintour.bsky.social to discuss the life and film career of the the Diva of all Divas, #JudyGarland! Follow the link for the full #podcast episode! 🍎: tiny.cc/TMRAppleJG 🟢: tiny.cc/TMRSpotifyJG 📺: patreon.com/themixedreviews

Photobombing myself on #FCF. What a world.

In what's becoming a regrettable holiday tradition, @tightywhitiesand.bsky.social convinced me to view A Very Kitty Cocktail Party, in which kittens in knitwear behave decorously among holiday decorations that they disdain to acknowledge. It's like having Beatrix Potter injected into my veins.

Me: Traffic was horrible! It was backed up to the bridge on, um, that road with the yellow house, you know, with the pride flag… Him: We’ve lived here 15 years and don’t know the road names, do you. Me: Untrue! Him: Name the road parallel to ours. Me: I’m Too Pretty To Know Street Names Street.

After spying Jasika Nicole on a random episode of something or other a couple of weeks ago, I've been tempted to start a rewatch of Fringe. But I don't know if I'm ready for 100 episodes of insanity—excellent insanity though it is.

When you fall down the late-night internet rabbit hole after wondering if that grad school friend of yours still stars in self-fisting fetish porn.

Watching a holiday Disney movie about the Jonas Brothers wanting to be Jonases and brothers but not necessarily the Jonas Brothers and the pretty one took off his shirt so it's already better than the Pentatonix movie. (I can't tell one Jonas from the other.)

You should follow my lead, slip out of yours too.

May I quietly opine that Pluribus is my favorite show of 2025?

This big ol’ goof. #FCF

Me: That trial new brand of contact lenses is great! Opthamologist: No issues? Me: When I opened them I got squirted in the face, but... Him: Oh no! Me: I know, at least buy me dinner first, right? Him: What? Me: Never mind. Him: Oh. Heh-heh-heh! Squirted in the face. Buy me dinner. Heh-heh-heh!

I won't invoke by name Netflix's first holiday movie of the season with Alicia Silverstone, because it features a teenaged witch gone right-wing nutjob and has far too many mentions of a disgraced wizardry franchise to be enjoyable. But in the Netflix tradition, it features a guy's hard 6-pack.

I tuned into the Mae Martin series Wayward on Netflix for Toni Collette. The show didn't really compel me enough to keep up the momentum of watching it. Finally reached the final episode last night, and this morning I'm regretting that the show became an incomprehensible mess by the end.

i really wanna send you one of these… 🫣 #gayartist #queerartist

Oldest selfie on your phone Circa 2007, when Fred as a kitten had a thing for balancing herself on my head.

Every time I walk by the comedy club in a suburban mall that seems able only to book problematic or outright canceled comedians for sad, late-night weeknight gigs, I think to myself, "There's a sitcom in this premise, somewhere." (Note: I will be suing whoever runs with the idea.)

I blame you. #FCF

I truly hope Glenn Close puts her All's Fair deadpan line reading of “Do you ever think about how much happier we’d all be if your mother swallowed?” on her Emmys sizzle reel.

Best *ahem* advertisement ever.

The new Nintendo Store app in a midweek attempt to shame my life choices. I remain unmoved, however.

With its private jets, sports cars, luxury brand name dropping, flutes of bubbly, and scenery chewing by every actress of a certain age Ryan Murphy could cast in this high-camp schlockfest, All's Fair is at the same time a deeply terrible show and one I CANNOT WAIT to watch again and again.

Accomplished: a morning's brisk, sunny autumnal walk through piles of the neighborhood's sweet-smelling leaves to perform my civic duty and vote in the local elections. Yet to do: sit around for the rest of the morning while scratching my 'nads and eating leftover Halloween sour gummy worms.

I always forget Furpoc is a local, annual thing until the weekend every year when the apps overflow with good boy pups wanting to run their fingers through dad’s chest hair. (Dad has little chest foliage, sadly, but feel free to riff a fingernail over his ear hair.)

Regretting You (2025) feels like insipid Hallmark fodder hopped up on product sponsorship deals, most egregiously an awkwardly-inserted extended paean to the joys of AMC theater concession stands. The juveniles are fine. The adults involved seem embarrassed to have signed on. (With just cause.)

When you know you're heading to a truly terrible movie.

For the very first November first in my long and storied existence, I woke up this morning wondering how soon I could put up my Christmas decorations.

Final reminder for Nov 8: a queer‑affirming, non‑sexual space to draw, be seen, and connect through art.

Happy halloweenie? #FCF

Blue Moon (2025) has Ethan Hawke monologuing in a barroom as Lorenz Hart, lyricist and raging heterossssexual (kind of a wild take), on his former partner Richard Rodger’s opening night triumph with Oklahoma! The film’s a stagey affair propelled by Hawke’s alternating charisma and abject neediness.

New episode live! 🎙️ Hear @charlescoleartpage.bsky.social and Gabe Vasquez on how sobriety fuels queer erotic art and personal freedom. Stream Art in the Raw now! 🏳️‍🌈🎨 #NewEpisode #ARTintheRAW #SobrietyAndCreativity

Vaguepost of the day: Sure, I think it’d be grand to indulge in and profit from an entire album of (admittedly lovely) songs about how horribly wronged I might be, without admitting personal culpability. But I’d still like to hear a techno album of answer songs from David Harbour. For reasons.

My annual neighborhood Trunk or Treat wrapup: This year's popular costumes were KPop Demon Hunters for the girls (Rumi exclusively), Steve (from Minecraft) for the boys, and Ninja turtles for the wee ones. One child dressed as Sophia from the Golden Girls. (I'm guessing her gay dad's choice?)

Don't make me shove in your earbuds and tune in your device to this thoughtful and entertaining podcast, young man. 🧐

Overexposed? #FCF

Grindr Rando: are you a barber Me: Nope. Him: do you know a barber Me: Would you like the name of my barber? Him: would he cut my hair while I’m naked and stroking Me: He’s a little old straight Italian guy, so no? Him: would you do it then Me: Butchering someone’s hair sounds fun, but nah.

Former Freshman Dorm Friend: You know your old roommate Charlie is a drug addict now. Me: No! Former Dorm Hooligan: Did you know we named Charlie as Most Likely to Die Young? Me: No! Another Dorm Hooligan: Hey, did you hear Charlie was in jail 3 times? Me: No! (But am I surprised? No.)

The worst thing possible happened during my reunion weekend: someone added me to a (shudder) group text chat.

My novella, Sleazy A (why not buy the ebook at the link below?), is heavily based on my undergrad sexual romps. On campus for my reunion, I’ve revisited a few of my tearoom haunts. They’ve been renovated to cut down on cruising…but they still stink like piss and damp. Some things never change.

If my last post didn’t give it away, I’m at my alma mater for my 40th reunion. With my wool hoodie sweater, suede overshirt, and jeans, the guy at Starbucks told me that I look like ‘a cool Robin Hood’ and the gal at the bookstore checkout said I looked like ‘her dad…but he’s a snappy dresser, too.’

I’m sitting in a Starbucks that occupies a lot where, in my college days, I’d buy a Slurpee and play the arcade game Crystal Castles, watching a college couple indulge in a vicious game of slapjack, all the while wishing I could be so pure of heart (instead of bitter and depraved).

I nearly did things that would’ve merited a swabbing on my next sexual health screening. Nearly. (But my doctor will still be disappointed for me.)

I know we’re only halfway through October, but already I am looking forward to the approaching festive season.* * I refer to the month in which Netflix releases a crapload of brain-dead holiday films that are flimsy excuses for buff men to remove their shirts for no sane reason. That season.

Gentle reminder to stretch before intense physical activity