John Lee Tipton With Brothers Ike, Jr and Ron

What to do on these hot and muggy days of the summer of 2023? Make a video compilation of old photos and videos of me and my two younger brothers John and Isaac Tipton, Sr. John passed away September of last year. This video compilation of our past times together will keep his memory alive forever.

Night Out in Rehoboth Beach May 24, 2015

Recently a posted a video of one of our (me and Pat's) night out in Palm Springs. 

There is a night life (such as it is) right here at home in Rehoboth Beach Delaware. This is a compilation of some pictures and videos that I took about eight years ago during one of Pat's visits to me here at my home near Rehoboth Beach. 

Pat is planning on coming down later this summer for a week's visit. He was here last year for a visit. 

Since I began caregiving for Bill two and a half years ago, and COVID restrictions, I haven't been anywhere but here at home in Delaware. I am so looking forward to Pat's visit this year so we can make more memories.

When I see these photo/video compilations I think of all those trips I used to take alone. The few times I went with friends of paid someone to go with me, those trips all turned out to be only trolling for sex for the friends who went with me and even the two guys who I paid to go along with me. 

I used to envy to gay guys who went on trips with friends. They all seemed to have such a good time. What was the matter with me? Was my personality that bad? Was I that unattractive? 

During high school gym classes I was usually picked last for the teams. Was that an extension of my loser status? 

No, that wasn't the problem. The problem was that those friends who went with me and even those two guys I paid for were selfish sex addicts. How refreshing to have a friend, albeit late in life, like Pat. A truly nice guy (cute too!) who was and still is and interested in me for myself. How refreshing!

At this time of my life when my time when I'm a caregiver, the quarterly trips are out. Hopefully, sometime in the future Pat and I can resume our quarterly trips to California, Philadelphia, and Canada. But for now, his upcoming visit to Rehoboth Beach (maybe next month) is much anticipated.

P. S.

Surprised that even here in our little Rehoboth Beach gay bar we even have a boy toy go go dancer?

Night Out in Palm Springs Feb 15, 2019

Ah, sweet memories of the last time Pat and I visited Palm Springs, California, February of 2019. Then COVID hit and all travel came to an abrupt stop.

During COVID Bill had two strokes. That was two and a half years ago. I've been his full time caregiver since. I cannot go anywhere while I'm caregiving for Bill. 

Bill is off of home hospice care now, for the second time. His condition has stabilized. That's because of the excellent care his caregiver is giving him (of course, smile). 

I have accepted that for some years I will continue to be Bill's caregiver which means I won't be making trips to anywhere, let alone Palm Springs, my favorite place on this earth. 

If I should outlive Bill, I'm not sure I could even travel to Palm Springs. I'm reading and hearing that the airlines are making travel very difficult with smaller seats and increased fairs. And since I haven't been working at the hotel these past two and a half years I don't even know that I could afford a trip to Palm Springs. And of course there is my physical condition. I'm not steady on my feet. I'm an old man. Way past my prime. But oh how I would like to return to Palm Springs at least one more time. Pat would too. Maybe, just maybe this February 2024 Pat and I can return to Palm Springs and visit friends and check out all of our favorite places in that Oasis in the Desert......Palm Springs. One of the few places on this planet where I can be myself.

Lazy Summer Days

View of Casa Tipton-Kelly from our mosquito infested back yard 

How are you all doing? 

It's been awhile since I posted an update on our situation here are Casa Tipton-Kelly.

Well, I can tell you that the mosquitos are biting and the heat and humidity are oppressive. If I go outside at all I have to suit up in my white shirt, long denim pants, combat boots and Safari hat with mosquito net. Even then, after only moving around for about ten minutes my T-shirt is soaked with sweat. Ah summertime, we have arrived!

I wish I could work outside in our beautiful backyard more but I can't because of the heat and humidity and the mosquitos. I do like to refresh my pond with about twenty-five minutes of well water (all free and not contaminated with chlorine) at least once a day. The fish like it too. I also have to clean out the filter of the floating solar water fountains from algae buildup at least once a day. The fish like those bubbles which provide much need oxygen for them. I recently installed a large solar panel to provide even more air bubble in the pond. 

Bill continues to need my care. His health is fine, as far as I can tell. No open leg wounds. He's swallowing better now that I'm pureeing all his food, mainly oatmeal and bananas. He's getting much better care at home here than he ever would at a $$$$$ assisted or total care facility. Bill is in his own home and we're together. I have accommodated myself to the fact that caring for Bill for the next few years is my reality. Could be a lot worse. Bill is not in pain and knows who I am. He can also get to the bathroom by himself and rarely has "accidents." Of course I would like to resume my quarterly travels with Pat but that is not to be in my foreseeable future. It's been two and a half years since Pat and I have embarked on one of our adventurous travels to our favorite destinations in Palm Springs, Philadelphia and Canada. Friends of mine just returned from France. I don't think we'll ever go to France but maybe Japan. But in the meantime, there are plenty of places to visit right here on the North American continent. 

I'm not sure if I could ever return to work at the hotel again. I'm having more trouble just walking. I'm very unsteady. And walking up stairs is a real chore for me. I have to pull myself up by holding on the banister. Last night I was cleaning the kitchen and living room wood floors and on a couple occasions I had to go down on the floor on bended knee. I almost couldn't get up. It's amazing how weak my legs are. 

My arthritis continues to worsen. Yesterday I broke the antlers off of one of my acrylic reindeer I had sitting on our kitchen counter. That makes two things my stiffened arthritic hands have knocked off our kitchen counter. Last week it was the glass mixer jar I use to puree Bill's oatmeal meals. That cost me $45 to replace that jar. I was lucky I could find a replacement on Amazon. I broke my heart to break the antlers off that reindeer. I had two of them on our kitchen counter. I bought then many years ago at Walmart in Exton, Pennsylvania in an after Christmas sale. Of course they are irreplaceable. I ordered some acrylic glue from Amazon. I will try and repair them. 

Last night I had a bad attack of allergies. The runny nose. Runs like an open spigot. I had to go to bed early just to get away from it. If I lay on my side while sleeping all that mucus drains back into my body. I'm better now. If I take allergy pills I can usually head off the worst of the sneezing and runny nose. When I was deep into the sneezes last night I noticed the allergy tablet still on the counter. I had forgotten to take it! 

Seems like this post is nothing but complaints. Not my intention folks, just telling it like it is around here at Casa Tipton-Kelly. We're entering into the depths of the summer season. A good two months of this heat and humidity.  I am thankful though we're not getting the worst of the heat that much of the rest of the country is suffering through. And I am so thankful our air conditioning works great. Of course I pay a big bill for that air conditioning but that's a small price to pay for the comfort we enjoy and are able to survived in this heat and humidity. 

 

Spo's 61st Birthday

This is an annual You Tube posting from my good friend, the much loved and famous blogger "Ur-Spo" of Phoenix Arizona.

I discovered "Spo" (Michael) about twelve years ago through my late friend The Cajun's blog. I saw his handsome bearded face as a Favorite Bloggers link on the Cajun's blog and was intrigued. I'm a sucker for handsome men with dark beards.

Ten years ago, after following Spo's blog "Spo Reflections" for a couple years he suggested to me a Blogger east coast get together. At that time I worked at a hotel in Lewes, Delaware.  I immediately took up his suggestion and made all the arrangements for the first Bloggerpalooza.

And Old Time photo shot at Rehoboth Beach, DE. That's me in the center with the red bandana around my throat. Michael and David are to the far left in the back row. Everyone without exception in this photo is a fabulous person. All bloggers and great folks! What fun we had! 

That gathering of previously anonymous bloggers who got to meet each other in person was a great success! We immediately decided to make it an annual affair. The next year we had another Bloggerpalooza but alas that was the last one for various reasons I won't go into here. Several of those bloggers have since passed over the Rainbow Bridge or otherwise disappeared into the ether of the great bloggersphere. But I am happy to report I have since reunited with Spo and his longtime partner/husband "Someone" (David) in Palm Springs California during a couple of me and Pat's visits

A picture I SHOULD NOT OF TAKEN at "Indulge", Spo and Someone's lodging of choice when staying in Palm Springs. That's Pat with his arms folded on his red baseball cap and Michael's friend Doug to his right. Immediately after taking this picture I was admonished NOT TO TAKE PICURES! THERE ARE NAKED MEN EMERGING FROM THE POOL! Properly chastised I put my phone away.

to that wonderful desert oasis. In fact Pat and I attended Michael and David's

These two handsome guys are Michael and David on their 17th anniversary

wedding which was a great privilege. By the way, Spo is taller in person than he seems to be on his blog, well over four feet, somewhat to my surprise. Cute elfin like guys like Michael I always expect to be about 5'5". Not Spo, he is well over four feet, almost six feet.

If you're not already a fan of Spo and his blog I urge you to visit his blog. His humor, wisdom and wry view of his world and the world around us is a treasure. And, you get free therapy lessons. 

I am making a major effort not to make this blog posting about me (as I am often wont to do) but I do want to express how fortunate I am to have made a friend like Michael and his husband David and all those others that I met at the Bloggerpalooza. Maybe someday we will all get together again in person. That is the day I look forward to but in the meantime 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MICHAEL!!!

Me with my idol, the handsome Spo (Michael) at Rehoboth Beach 2013

Summer Is Here!

 

Ah yes, summer has finally arrived!

This is the best spring I can remember since we moved here to southern Delaware in 2006. Most days were mild weather, not the hot and muggy weather we're having now. And yes, we're here with the hot and muggies!

I can't work outside when the weather is this humid. Just another reason I would never move to Florida as many gay Rehoboth Beach neighbors have opted to do. Ft. Lauderdale is their destination of choice. How anyone, let along gay men could move to Florida which is now ruled by the Trump wannabe despot Ron DeSantis is beyond my comprehension. Oh sure, go in the wintertime. Palm Spring California is my destination of choice to escape the cold winds and monochrome landscape of southern Delaware  in winter.

When summer officially arrives like it did this Fourth of July weekend. I always marvel at the yearly increase in traffic coming down here from on north. All for the "beach experience." I like the "beach experience" too, at least once during the season. Just to mingle with the nighttime crowds on the Rehoboth Beach boardwalks checking out all the cheesy games to wind even cheesier prizes always pleases me. Last year Pat came down for a visit and we were able to partake of that summertime Rehoboth Beach boardwalk ritual

I do like it the experience. I'm not one for actually going to the beach and laying in the sand. Not for the past twenty-five years or so since I discovered I kept getting these precancerous aconite keratosis. Which reminds me, I have another dermatology appointment this Friday for a bothersome spot on my lower right back. My appointment is at twelve noon, traffic should be delightful. I say that is sarcasm. To get to my dermatologist I have to go south on Route One, also known as Coastal Highway. Friday afternoon, noon? Should be bumper to bumper vehicles. I will have to leave at least an hour early even though in normal time it only takes me about ten minutes to get to my dermatologist's office. 

This morning I hit a snag. My DirecTV isn't working correctly.  I record (DVR) most of the programs I watch. Now my recorder is acting funky. NOT WORKING! What? No TV? I mostly "watch" TV as background. Most of the time MSNBC and "The View" when I'm having lunch. I called DirecTV this morning to arrange to have a service man come out. OF course I get a woman with a heavy Philippine accent (thank you). Yes, I can tell a Philippine accent now since so many of my tech support calls go to the Philippines. Before DirecTV was taken over by AT&T they used to have US based tech support. No more! So I call and she's reading from a script. I had a little trouble getting her off that script but I finally did when I told her "I know you're reading from a script but what I need is a service man out here." I'm paying enough for a service package. I know what the problem is, the DVR. I don't have to go through all her troubleshooting scripted menu items. 

The earliest she could get a service man out here was Friday. Wouldn't you know it, the SAME time I have my dermatology appointment. Isn't that always the way it is? So I arranged to have the service appointment this Saturday.

I won't be missing too much TV this week. All the regulars are off taking vacation and they have been replaced by second tier folks which generally aren't as good. That's another reason I can do this long blog post. Nothing to watch on TV live (I can't DVR). I DVR so I can zap through the commercials which are getting to me more and more every year. What happened to the big selling point of pay TV being "no commercials." Most of the stations have just as many commercials as the aptly named commercial TV. Just another con job. Maybe someday I'll just ditch the whole TV addiction. 

I hope Pat can make it down here later this summer before the days get too short. I don't know if I told you all, he sold his penthouse at the Royal Connaught Hotel and moved into a cute little house a few blocks away from his former home. He's getting settled into his mini house (no thirteen foot ceilings in that 568 square foot house). He also has a very interesting neighbor or neighbors. I think it is a crack house. All sorts of suspicious looking characters in and out of that house all later hours of the day. Biker types with top knot hair do's. What's with that?  His neighbor is banging away at all hours of the night. Nothing before twelve noon though. Sleeping late from being up all night. I couldn't live that close to someone. That's why I'll never move from Casa Tipton-Kelly.  I like my neighbors but I have plenty of space between us. I'm playing my music LOUD right now as I usually do when I'm blogging. If I had a neighbor with a house attached to mine I would have to turn my music down, which I don't like to do. I like my non-stop "music for shops" LOUD.

Let's see, what else. Friends of mine are visiting France right now. I've never been to a foreign country except Canada, which I don't count as foreign. I've often thought I would like to visit a foreign country before I check out but after reading reports of the tourist hordes in Europe exacting COVID revenge tourism on the poor Europeans, I think that option is out. However, Pat has always wanted to visit Japan. I would like to visit Japan too. It's a long flight (twenty hours from Philly, ten from California). I'm thinking if I survive my caretaking responsibilities and I can still move around, Pat and I just may take that visit to Japan. But first I have to visit my old haunts in Provincetown and Pittsburgh. Just once for old times sake. To relive old memories. Then I can make new memories although I won't have those new memories too long will I?

Well, I've rambled on enough now. Time for dinner (I eat late, about 8:30 or 9:00 PM)) and take my chances with my new malfunctioning DVR on my DirecTV/

I hope all is well in everyone's world who is reading this blog. Lately I've really been feeling good about my life here except of course the political situation, I won't feel totally comfortable until the Orange Traitor is behind bars. 

Be well everyone!

Happy Fourth of July!

 

Our American flag this morning from our garage and our peaceful and free neighborhood here in southern coastal Delaware. President Biden's summer home is only three miles away on the upper left. We always know when he arrives because his three Secret Service helicopters make a pass over Casa Tipton-Kelly.

Here we go folks, another Fourth of July!

This year we are faced with an existential crises, our very democracy is on the line.

A failed reality TV show star and con man/crook has succeeding beyond his wildest expectations of conning millions of gullible Americans that he is the ONLY person who should be the next president of the United States. 

Hey folks, I'm no fan of the doddering old man who is currently our president, Joe Biden but know this, I would vote for a dead Joe Biden in his coffin before I would vote for the Traitor Trump. 

I am very surprised and saddened that Trump has managed to con many otherwise "normal" Americans into believing his shit. What the hell is the matter with these people? Sure, Joe Biden is a piss poor communicator (I can't stand to watch and hear him slur his way through yet another speech). 

 Sure, Trump is entertaining like an old Jewish Catskill comic (which is obviously where he learned his stichk from during his youth). But this country doesn't need an entertainer, especially a crook like Trump who only cares about himself and seeking retribution on those who don't bow to his childish narcissism. 

Sure, we can do better with our politicians. We have several good ones, of both political parties. As regular followers of this blog know I used to be a Republican before I left the party when George W. Bush and Karl Rove tried to end my VA benefits (thankfully the Senate put a stop to that and Bill and I were grandfathered in). That's when I realized the Republicans are only interested in cutting taxes for their rich friends and keeping the poor and downtrodden poor and downtrodden. 

I left the Republican Party after Pat Buchanan's speech at the 1992 Republican Convention speech which he vowed to keep gays like me as second class citizens. I chill went down my spine when I saw all those clean cut lily white conventioneers enthusiastically applauding his denigrations of gays like me. That's when I realized that if our country was like Nazi Germany, this "nice" Americans would be quite comfortable seeing gays like me in a concentration camp. Seriously folks, that's the way many of them think under their veneer of respectability. These days the Trump Republicans don't even bother with that a veneer of respectability. Gays again are being used as the boggyman to get the white Christian Evangelicals to the polls to vote the cowardly Republicans in power to stave off the Hordes of Diversity. 

With the now failed Supreme Court who are quickly reversing all the progress that's been made over the last seventy years (and believe me, gay marriage is next then reversing Brown Versus Board of Education). Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Bret Kavanaugh, and Neil Gorsuch are all bought and paid for.

Today we can still celebrate our gained freedom that the Fourth of July denotes but will we be able to celebrate this time next year? Will the law in this land finally be applied to Donald Trump and his lifetime of crime? Will the law be applied to his enablers who attempted to overthrow our government on January 6th? Will the inept Justice Department and FBI finally get off their asses and DO SOMETHING? And not be intimidated by the threats of physical violence by Trump and his mob of supporters? I really don't know folks. Time will tell. 

But today I celebrate the Forth and our freedom. My freedom to write this blog post. 

I have faith that right will win out. There are more of us than there are of Them. We see the trailer park trash to goes to Trump's rallies but Trump's support is much deeper than those fools who Trump has successfully suckered. Even though most of the Republicans put their own selfish interests first by staying in power than their oath to the Constitution, I am confident that history will treat them as the spineless, self-serving cowards that they are. Even those like Chris Christie who slam Trump now but when questions would they vote for Trump is he was the nominee, they always answer "Yes." WHAT THE FUCK IS THE MATTER WITH THESE PEOPLE?

I think the answer is they're afraid if a Democrat gets in power that the minorities will invade their homes and take everything they own and the gays will turn their children into drag queens. Really folks, that's what many of them believe. Sad isn't it?

My rant is done now. I feel a little better.

Happy Fourth of July everyone and I hope I'm here next year to post another Happy Fourth of July.