Category Archives: “You Just Can’t Make This Stuff Up…”

You Just Can Not make This Up

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There is this mother and daughter who are both Ybor people and both loved by everybody.  One nigh the daughter was in a club with us. Her Mom had gone to get cigarettes. Of course Mom had to stop and talk with everybody and have a couple drinks too. The daughter was getting more and more annoyed with her Mom.  On the last call she said to her Mom….. “If you don’t get back in 3 minutes I’m going to give your purse to a homeless person! Don’t even think I will not do it!!!” Mom was back in 2 minutes LMAO!

 

You Just Can Not Make This Up

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    The year was 1994. We made a big purchase. A new 54″ rear projection TV, it was on sale at Sears. We were so excited about the new technology. In 2009, twenty years later the TV was still working just fine. Carrie said that we couldn’t buy a new TV until this one had loss of color jets or it just gives out.
    The years continued to tick by. Then in 2013 I couldn’t take it anymore. While vacuuming I discovered…. when accidentally un plugged the TV it stopped working. Hum….. do I dare???? YES, I DO!!!
    Yelling CARRIE the TV just died!!!  I thought I might just as well throw in a tear or two! Carrie tried with the remote control but the TV didn’t come back on. We went that day to Sam’s Club and bought our 1st big flat screen TV to be delivered the next day.
     That night Carrie discovered the TV was unplugged and wanted to cancel the new TV. I just smiled and said sorry already paid for the new one!!!
     LMAO… The new TV was one of the best things we ever bought. We are not waiting 24 years to buy the next one!!! Or maybe we will???

 

You Just Can Not make This Up

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   One day a high local political person was talking with us. Then he shared this very strange story but confirmed story. His Great Grandmother had married a much older man for money, much to the disapproval of her family. They lived in a large Victorian mansion in Washington D.C. Together they had 3 kids then the husband passed away.
     After a short time all the money was gone too. His great grandmother started to rent out rooms to ‘ladies of the night’. She also ran gambling games out of the mansions many rooms.
    At one of these poker games she won 2 monkeys. Our friends Grandmother remembers playing with the monkeys as a young girl. One of the monkeys started to grow and…. grow. It wasn’t a monkey but a gorilla!!! He was given his own room. One day the gorilla got out and walked down the street to a produce store. This was in the late 1890’s.
    The people had never seen a gorilla before. Some fainted, others screamed!!! The police were called. By the time they arrived the gorilla had left and went back to his room at the house. The police went to the home and proceeded up the stairs to arrest the gorilla. A few minutes later both officers were tossed down the stairs by the scared gorilla.
    The Washington D.C. National Zoo was called. They came out and tranquilized the poor scared animal. Told that they could not keep a Gorilla as a pet, the gorilla was donated to the National Zoo. This was the very first Gorilla at the Washington D.C. National Zoo. The gorilla lived many years and was a huge hit with the children. Funny enough the family went to visit and mingle with the family raised gorilla at the zoo for years.

Western Lowland Gorilla (Gorilla gorilla gorilla), portrait. Orphaned gorillas reintroduced into the wild. Projet: "Protection des Gorilles", Gabon and Congo Distribution: Tropical Rainforest, Western Central Africa (Nigeria to DRC)

You Can’t Make this Up

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the-monkees_album-cover-1966-colgemsOne night a good friend was talking about the crazy things we did as teenagers. With a BIG GRIN on her face our friend Paula said “I touched Dave Jones of The Monkees door knob!!!”  We all turned and asked WHAT DID YOU TOUCH??? Yes his door knob. We asked her to please explain. As a teenager Paula and her girl friends heard that the Monkees had played in a big town close by. The girls took 3 bus transfers to reach the hotel where Dave Jones had stayed in. They took the elevator up to the 20th floor and asked the cleaning person what room he stayed in. They then all took turn touching the door knob and screamed!!!! We asked what would have happened if he was still there and answered the door? Paula said we all would have fainted!!!

You Just Can Not Make This Up

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Strange Inheritance.
    A friend of ours parents had both passed. He didn’t know anything at all about his fathers side of the family, except the small town that the father was raised in. One day he and his wife took the 7 hour dive to visit this small town.  There in the small towns cemetery were several tombstones with his family name on them.  They notice that there were fresh flowers in pots next to the graves. Hum… wonder who put them there?
    So they wrote a note as they knew no one there, and put it in a zip lock baggy under one of the flower pots. Several months later an e-mail came in. It was the person who had put the flowers there. Turns out to be a 3rd cousin our friends didn’t know he had. The two became Internet friends. A year went by then there was a strange phone call….. It was a person who said he was a friend of the 3rd cousin. The cousin had passed away and had saved the email print outs of their conversations. Our friends wife said this was the only chance to see what he looked like. So they got in the car and made the 7 hour funeral trip.
    Arriving just before the funeral parlor viewing was about to close. There were a couple of people there and they told him how he was almost blind, let his wife do everything and a bit of a hermit. The family resemblance was truly familiar to his own being. Then they invited them to stay for the funeral the next day. A quick decision was made to stay over night for the funeral.
     After the small funeral ceremony the attorney asked to talk with them. He explained that in this state there was no common wife law. So his live in girlfriend of 30+ years had no rights and he was the legal closest living relative.  Our friend did the right thing and signed the estate over to her right away.
    Sadly we have heard this same funeral story many times before in the LGBT Community. Now is the time to make your final plans known and legal.

 

You Just Can Not make This Up

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One time we hosted the famous Gay artist Steven Walker. We did a private showing at a friends home on the water. At this show we sold over $15,000 worth of his art work. Mostly in signed prints. I had inspired Steven for one of his painting. Steven gave us a sign print of it. He had a very strange promoter with him. The lady was from a small town in Saskatchewan, Canada. After the big party on Saturday and VIP Treatment all over town, we all went to the T-Dance at the Suncoast Resort. In the back room of our store we had a big crock pot of hotdogs for everyone. The promoter actually said to us, as we were cleaning up……those were the best hotdog buns ever. May I take the left over buns back to Canada with me. We just smiled and said “Yes of course.” The buns came from Walmart. WTF LMAO

 

You Just Can Not make This Up

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Our niece Nikki and her friend Karmen were in town visiting from Wisconsin. We all went to the Ybor Wine bar for a drink. Here we ran into our good friend Leo. Asked what he was doing. He was waiting for a friend and going out for drinks. His handsome friend walked in. After a couple more glasses of wine we invited them to go for a ride in our crazy car Priscilla. We all went off for a fun drive with our dog Miss Amber as the co pilot.  Leo’s friend was Christopher Sanfeliz. Killed at Pulse Nightclub.

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You Just Can Not Make This Up

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FinishingSchoolH2

    In the 1970’s I lived in a upscale high rise condo building in Minneapolis. I had a gay friend there who’s names was Mike. I will not tell you his last name. He was from a very famous and well to do family. Mike loved to go in drag and his drag name was Monica.  Every Wednesday Mike’s Grandmother would arrive in her chauffeur driven Rolls Royce.  Mike and Grandmother would go to a private club on top of a skyscraper for lunch and cocktails.
    Then Mike started to do what he called day time drag and asked us to call him by his drag name all the time now. After about 6 month Monica announced that she was going to be in drag the rest of her life. Grandmother knew about Monica but not the day time version. So Wednesday came and Monica asked grandmother to come up to the apartment and talk first….  Monica explained that for the rest of her life she was going to dress as a woman.
     Grandmother just smiled and said, “From now on I will call you my Granddaughter Countess Monica! Let’s go to the club for martinis.”
    Their Wednesday date continued on until grandmothers passing. Monica fell in love with a man and his 2 young children. Together they raised the children. Monica and her grandmother opened a finishing school for young girls called, “Countess Monica’s Finishing School for Proper Young Girls.”
    Today Monica is a Grandmother herself.

You Just Can Not make This Up

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One of the oldest Gay bars in Tampa was also the wildest one. The KIKI One was where the bus station is today. #2 was a few block away and today is a parking lot. #3 The KIKI III was on Kennedy Blvd. It closed a couple years ago. #4 was in St. Petersburg. 10 years ago a semi truck drove thru it.  Rumors had it was and unhappy customer. #3 was also a hang out for street hustlers. That’s not the crazy part of this story. Just behind the KIKI III was a nice bungalow home. It was owned by a wild leather guy. In the dinning room he had welders come in and build a prison cell. He would go to the KIKIK III and pick up guys. They would go to his home and play prisoner and cell guard. One day he decides to sell the home. The realtor tells him the cell has to go……. the owner said no it was welded in place. The home was on the market for 3 days and sold for full asking price. The straight couple who bought it actually said “We can’t wait to host our 1st dinner party in the cell.”

You Just Can Not make This Up

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    Lady Bunny (of New York’s Wigstock fame) was in town this past Sunday at Liquid Lounge to perform. About ten+ years ago Bunny was performing at Georgie’s Alibi in St. Petersburg. Clayton Hood, a local sculpture, artist and friend of ours had painted a beautiful painting of Bunny. It was quite large, probably 3 feet by 3 feet.
    We thought to ourselves, “How will she ever get this on a plane back to NYC?”
    After her show Clayton went on stage to present Bunny with this beautifully portrayal of his idol painting. Bunny thanks him but said, “No thank you!.”
     This upset Clayton.  So He….. started to auction the painting off to the audience. It sold for just over $500. Bunny said, “Thank You it was nice of you to auction this off for me. ” and put her hand out.
    Clayton laughed and said in his southern draw voice, “You didn’t want it… bitch!!! This is going to pay my bar tab tonight and the rest is going to local Gay Charity!!!”