A few things to cover today, so please try to keep up.

First, Colonial House rocks. I would so love to do a show like this. I think, just for shits and giggles, I'll sign up for the next one. The odds are I won't get picked, but what the heck.

I didn't much care for the sanctimonious Southern Baptist preacher who was the governor of the colony (though his leadership skills seemed much better than the touchy feely guy who replaced him), but I felt horrible for what his family went through during the filming (they found out early on that their son and their daughter's fiance were in a car wreck; the fiance was killed, but they haven't told what happened to their son. The family went back to Texas; last night's episode ended with the preacher/governor returning, without his family, but they didn't say if he was staying or if his family would be returning. I doubt it).

On a less serious note, they showed two of the guys skinny dipping. Yeah, it was hot.

After watching the show and the little 'making of' special, I surfed for a little while until I ran across Oprah's 'Colonial House' special. It seems she spent a couple of days with in the colony toward the end of the show. It was fascinating having just seen the first episode then being able to see how the community had changed over the four months. People were thinner. A lot thinner. And really, really filthy. But they really seem to have come together as a group, so I'm really looking forward to watching them come together during the upcoming episodes.

Oh, and one of the guys on the show is gay. Apparently this becomes an issue, so I'm curious to see what happens.

Earlier in the evening I went to a fundraiser for a charity called Living Beyond Belief. The group raises money to give scholarships to teens who work as HIV/AIDS peer educators. Great organization, but the event was a bit of a cluster fuck. The invitation said the event started at 6. Well, that's when the doors opened and the silent auction started. The actual event didn't start until 8:30. Or rather, that's when it would have started if the talent had shown up on time. As it was, things didn't get started until 9:15. I don't know if it was Rosie Perez who was late or Daphne Rubin-Vega, but I'm not a big enough fan of either of them to stick around.

The important thing is that the group raised decent money at the event (I'm pretty sure I won a silent auction or two) and that the teens who were getting awards (the awards were called Butterfly Awards and were beautiful) were having a great time.

So that was my evening.

The last thing to talk about, assuming you're still with me, is a party this Friday night. My rugby team is going to London next week to participate in the Bingham Cup tournament (basically the World's Cup for gay rugby). We will be having a going away party at the Eagle on Friday night from 7 until . . . well, it will probably migrate to someone's apartment before the night is done. Since there are going to be so many out of town bloggers visiting New York, I hope to get some of them to the party. Of course, I want all the New York bloggers there as well.

The party kicks off with $5 all you can drink beer from 7 p.m. until the kegs run out. Now in fairness, given that the rugby boys are big drinkers, I doubt the kegs will last long. So get there early.

After that, we have drink specials until 10. The party will be on the roof deck unless it rains.

Expect rugby songs, beer fights, boat races, gratuitous nudity, and generally bad behavior. It should be fun. If any of you want more info about this, drop me a line (my e-mail link is on the right).