In which The Gay Recluse suggests a link.
The most beautiful ads are always for dead companies.

Like this one we recently took on 35th Street between 5th and 6th Avenue.

Does this company still exist? We hope not, because we don’t want to have to think about buying anything.

New York City is filled with ads for dead [...]

In which The Gay Recluse admires manholes.
Time/Location: May 2, 2008 on 35th Street between 6th Avenue and Madison.

By our calculations, there are approximately ten zillion manholes in New York City, and each has a cover; this is one of the largest and most striking. The alternating pattern of single and interlocking circles — reminiscent of [...]

In which The Gay Recluse reports on monthly traffic whoring metrix to the Board of Directors.
I. Summary
After a record month of whoring in March, we experienced a slight dip in April. But! It was still our second best month on record.
II. Traffic Whoring Metrix
WordPress
Total Views March: 13,957
Grand Total Number of Views: 48,973
Monthly Breakdown

[...]

In which The Gay Recluse again laments the suffocation of the gay voice in American literature.
If you’re like us, when you scanned through the list of books included in New York Magazine’s recent “New York City Canon 1968-2008,” you had one reaction: wtf! where are the gays? In every other format, gays are represented [...]

In which The Gay Recluse becomes increasingly obsessed with The George Washington Bridge.
Time and date of photographs: April 3, 2008, wheneverness.

Work was difficult this week.

It was hard to concentrate.

Life felt very distant.

We wished we could take a nap.

Somehow it never ends.
“I, too am obsessed with the George Washington Bridge, and have been ever since as stoned [...]

In which The Gay Recluse contemplates human conception from a safe distance.
Today we introduce our newest correspondent The Jessica Watch, who has expressed a willingness to satisfy our admittedly perverse voyeuristic impulses and keep us apprised as she moves ever closer to having a kid. TJW reports:
I just had a barrage of tests, all completed [...]

In which The Gay Recluse scores selected opinion pieces in The Times.
Paul Krugman/Taming the Beast
The Short Version: We need financial reform. So far none of the candidates seem to have noticed.
In his words: “But you don’t have to be an economic radical, or even a vocal reformer like Representative Barney Frank… to see that [...]

In which The Gay Recluse becomes increasingly obsessed with The George Washington Bridge.
Time and Date of morning photograph: March 21, 2008, 5:15pm-ish.
Notes: This is the view of the George Washington Bridge from the north, in the remotest and most abandoned part of Manhattan. We see the pilings of an old pier and — most [...]

In which The Gay Recluse kills two birds with one stone.
Today we received a certain amount of shit for “trashing” Arthur C. Clarke as a major closet-case only milliseconds after he died. Fair enough, we trashed him a little. But our purpose in doing so — besides being an internet traffic whore, of course — [...]

In which The Gay Recluse retreats to our garden in Washington Heights.
As it has done for thousands of years — and not just in our garden — the hellebore has sent forth the most beautiful, delicate blossoms at this improbable juncture, as if to taunt winter into sending one last storm. (Let’s hope nobody is [...]

In which The Gay Recluse runs a contest. Sort of.
We are extremely pleased to announce that we’ve already received our first hot-gay-statue submission, from Andrew of 801a.info, who tells us: “This is in Washington D.C., directly across from the White House. The pictures could be taken to look more salacious, I guarantee.”
Really? We’re not so [...]

In which The Gay Recluse scores selected opinion pieces in The Times.
David Brooks/Remembering the Mentor
The Short Version: Even though he was a Nazi, I loved William F. Buckley.
In her words: “Buckley was not only a giant celebrity, he lived in a manner of the haut monde.”
Score: F (Foolish)
In this column we have Brooks longing for [...]

In which The Gay Recluse scores selected opinion pieces in The Times.
Gail Collins/Hillary, Buckeye Girl
The Short Version: Hillary can’t compete against Barack’s charm. (This may help her in Ohio.)
In her words: “If Hillary is stumbling, it may be because there just isn’t any good path to take. ”
Score: B (Benign)
This column pleasantly meanders through the [...]

In which The Gay Recluse contemplates four uncommissioned masterpieces from the walls of an uptown subway station and finds evidence of paranoia, conspiracy and entropy.

Gail Collins/Notes from a Caucus
The Short Version: Caucuses are dumb.
In her words: “Most people have never been to a caucus, even if their state happens to have them.”
Score: B+
We weren’t dying of laughter or anything, but Collins made us smile a few times — e.g., “The parking lot was also accommodating the audience for the [...]

In which The Gay Recluse live-blogs the Super Bowl.
5:58. Our friend T___ arrives to give us haircuts. He tells us that his mother, who is only 64 years old, has just been diagnosed with an inoperable form of brain cancer. She has just begun chemotherapy, and to give him encouragement, we tell him about another [...]

There is something oddly unsatisfying about The Master, Colm Toibin’s 2004 treatment of the life of Henry James. Odd because we almost always love Toibin’s prose, which is elegant but unpretentious, and — unlike so much contemporary fiction — never shifts tenses or otherwise calls attention to itself in a distracting or superfluous manner. Occasionally [...]

In which The Gay Recluse scores selected opinion columns in The New York Times.
Paul Krugman/Lessons of 1992
The Short Version: There are many parallels between Clinton circa 1992 and Obama circa 2008. In case you forgot, Clinton was mercilessly crushed like a tiny bug the second he entered office.
In his words: “For those who are reaching [...]

First, it’s a great title for a documentary; just to say Gay Sex in the Seventies makes us a little more forgiving than is perhaps our natural tendency. Plus you get to see some great shots of vintage Big Apple; the west-side piers, the notorious truck bays across the highway, the Upper West Side when [...]

In which The Gay Recluse scores selected opinion columns in The Times.
Gail Collins/Editing Hillary’s Story
The Short Version: Why does Hillary have to be married to Bill? Can’t he just go away?
In her words: “[T]hey’re ruining the central selling point of her campaign, the story that explains why she’s the one a dispirited country should trust [...]