Archive for the ‘The Gay Recluse’ Category

In which The Gay Recluse finds a silver lining. We’ve already written about our bad karma at the 34th Street Station, which is filled with ungainly chrome columns and awkward ramps. But just the other day, we noticed an infinite wall of gold tile. We’re not sure why it took us two years to find. […]


In which The Vermonter, a former New Yorker who has retired to the rural life, checks in with The Gay Recluse. Recently we heard from our friend The Vermonter, who had this to say: I love manhole covers! I have been photographing them for years! Here are some favorites from a few years back… Whoas! […]


In which Dante and Zephyr take control of The Gay Recluse. Friends! To those who have doubted, rest assured: the movement grows! True, many of us are funny — some are even hilarious — but we must always me mindful of the overriding truth: not every cat is a lolcat! Friends! Behold the Tsarina! (Photograph […]


In which The Gay Recluse holds a contest. Sort of. Today we heard from reader Torrey, who wanted us to know that Columbus Circle offers more than just a high-end shopping experience: it has some hot gay statuary! Let’s check it out, shall we? Hey, this guy proves you don’t have to be hung like […]


In which The Gay Recluse reports on monthly traffic whoring metrix to the Board of Directors. I. Summary After two record months in March and April, May witnessed an overall drop in traffic whoring, but was still our third best month ever. Some of this can be attributed to the same macroeconomic trends that have […]


In which The Gay Recluse is rather perturbed. Hey, apparently all it takes to win a Lambda Literary Award for Men’s Fiction — even if you’re not gay! — is to write a seriously homophobic treatment of a teen romance, get a bunch of testimonials from important straights, and put a smokin’ hot cover on […]


In which The Gay Recluse updates his informal but rather telling quantitative analysis of Modern Love, the weekly Style Section (of The Times) column in which openly gay writers almost never appear, and even less frequently describe a romantic relationship. This week’s piece: My Dropout Boyfriend Kept Dropping In by Lee Conell Subject: A college […]


In which The Gay Recluse presents a gay alternative to this week’s Modern Love offering in The Times. Those looking for our quantitative analysis should click here. My Dropout Girlfriend Kept Dropping In By LEE CONELL and THE GAY RECLUSE Published: May 31, 2008 IN April of my freshman year, my girlfriend, Terry, decided she […]


In which The Gay Recluse is nonplussed. From our subway station at 163rd Street: We’re all for organ donation, but we find this advertisement rather too exuberant. Is this woman giving or receiving? Oh and another weird thing: someone graffiti numbered all the people in this poster. Seriously: creepy. “Awesome! I’m 24!” We’ve never seen […]


In which The Gay Recluse loves ferns and The Hills. This year we started watching The Hills. Everyone laughs at us when we tell them how much we like it. And how much better it is than Gossip Girl. (Not that we like Heidi or Spencer.) Everyone seems so upset by the idea that they […]


In which The Gay Recluse rejoices over the end of gentrification in Washington Heights. Rejoice, kind and courageous foes of gentrification! For those many of you who have added your voice to the cause — i.e., our allies in lower Manhattan, Brooklyn and other gentrified neighborhoods around the city who have never ceased to warn us […]


In which The Gay Recluse says goodbye to Berlin. Before we went to Berlin, we were kind of dreading it. After all, it was a work trip, which means we had to do some work. Plus, German is not our strongest language. And this eagle was not exactly welcoming, either! But then we saw how […]


In which The Gay Recluse holds a contest. Sort of. Ok, to all the doubters who thought that the Hot Gay Statue contest was winding down, we refer you to reader Genghis Kuhn, who recently wrote us with the following: [Herewith a] few pictures from my recent “research” trip to London. The firefighting statue is […]


In which The Gay Recluse stays in a swank hotel in Berlin. One good thing about going to Berlin for work was our company paid for the hotel, a little boutique called Goethe 87 in the west. Even though it wasn’t that expensive in euros — about 100/night — that’s the equivalent of $10,000 US […]


In which The Gay Recluse updates his informal but rather telling quantitative analysis of Modern Love, the weekly Style Section (of The Times) column in which openly gay writers almost never appear, and even less frequently describe a romantic relationship. This week’s piece: Instant Message, Instant Girlfriend by Roger Hobbs Subject: A nerdy but sweet […]


In which The Gay Recluse presents a gay alternative to this week’s Modern Love offering in The Times. Those looking for our quantitative analysis should click here. Instant Message, Instant Boyfriend By ROGER HOBBS and THE GAY RECLUSE Published: May 24, 2008 FOR several years I had a problem unusual among Internet geeks: I had […]


In which The Gay Recluse dreams of a new career. Ever since we visited Prague a few years ago we have been obsessed with becoming a sidewalk builder. This obsession was rekindled in Berlin, which has lots of sidewalks made of small stones. Please! Step into our office. Could someone please hand us a stone? […]


In which The Gay Recluse becomes increasingly obsessed with manhole covers. Here’s something you won’t typically read about in guidebooks to Berlin: the capital of Germany has some freakin’ kickass manhole covers! This is pretty much our favorite manhole cover these days. At 4′ by 4′, it’s not small, either.


In which The Gay Recluse becomes obsessed with orange tiles. We recently spent some time in Berlin at the conference center, much of which was done in orange tiles. Yes it was garish but there was something appealing about it. Maybe it’s just because it seems like nothing you ever see on this side of […]


In which The Gay Recluse remembers life in Washington Heights. We’re in Berlin, which means we’re nostalgic for the George Washington Bridge. Let’s take a walk down memory lane, shall we? This was last Sunday morning, as in May 11. We don’t remember it, either. This was at the end of the day Monday, which […]