i left the club at around 9:30 or so, drove by the sound guys (who were setting up at the art of armageddon, apparently), bought some smokes at the gas station, took another swig of that vodka (you don't think i drank all of it, do you? i can't drink 20 ounces of straight vodka, i'll pass out. there was about 5 ounces left.), parked behind the orchestra and stumbled down to the diner to get some eggs. as mentioned, i was there a little after 10:00 - i remember it being 10:14, exactly.

for reference, the symphony started at 15:00. so, i was going to hang out until 13:30-14:00 or something, then go down early, get a coffee and wait for the thing to start.

and, yes, i nodded off, i think for obvious reasons, now that you know the story. but, let's look at the facts here:

1) i intended to be in the diner for around 3-4 hours, on a sunday morning for brunch, from about 10:00-14:00, at the latest. 3-4 hours for brunch on sunday (from 10:00-14:00) might be the most normal thing in the history of normality - if there's something more normal than that, you'll have to be explicit about it, 'cause i can't imagine it.

2) so, i bought eggs and coffee a little after 10:00. let's say it was 10:30. so, let's say it got there about 10:45, which is about right for this place. i bought an extra side of french fries when i was done, probably around 11:30-ish. so, they would have got there about 11:45-ish. i got sleepy when i was eating my fries. i had not yet finished my coffee.

3) so, i must have dozed off - with my fries and coffee in front of me - from around 12:00-13:00.

4) i am in this establishment frequently, and have always bought things when i'm in it. i have, however, experienced some transphobia from the staff that i've largely shrugged off....

so, you can imagine that i was rather baffled when they sent the cook out - pilate-like. he's the messenger. he didn't care. - to tell me i "wasn't wanted here" and would have to leave before they "call the cops".

i'm not sure exactly what they would tell the officers, should they have come in, while i was finishing my fries and drinking my coffee. i'm not homeless. i wasn't asking people for food or money - and i hadn't finished my meal yet. they would essentially have to admit that they were throwing me out because of my gender expression, and i might point out that they're lucky i'm not an american citizen, because that's a lawsuit they'd have lost, if i was. i would have had to leave if it had come to that, surely, but i'd certainly want to get that report and publish it, as well as hand it off to the detroit business association, to let them deal with it.

it woke me up, at least. i ignored the cook, finished my fries, used the bathroom and came back to the front desk.

"can i talk to your manager?"

"what?"

"the cook just came out and told me you were going to call the police. i want to talk to the manager."

"you've been hear since 10:00."

"it's sunday brunch. i. demand. to. speak. to. your. manager."

"ok..."

a few minutes later, this 20-something arab guy comes out. you can put this together, right? he's not the owner here; i know the owner here. so, we've got some transphobic muslim day manager throwing the gays out of a restaurant he doesn't even own. not acceptable, at all. i rightfully gave him shit for overstepping his bounds...

"is that how you treat your customers?"

and i laced into him for a good ten minutes. i had food in front of me. and, yeah, i'm tired, but so what? when you come in and buy something in a restaurant, you get the booth until you're done. i'm not hanging out without buying anything. i'm not staying for a long time after i've finished, either. i'm literally in the middle of finishing a meal, and waiting for the symphony across the street to start.

and, i demanded a fucking apology.

he did give me one. see, and this is the point you actually want to see in this circumstance - you want this person to understand that they're in the wrong, even if it doesn't click immediately, and i think he clearly did realize that, i could see it in his facial expressions. he looked like he was worried he'd lose his job. he didn't lose his arrogance about it, and his apology was clearly coerced and bullshit, but he knew what he did was wrong.

you might expect me to call for a boycott of the detroit coney one on woodward avenue, after that. you might also expect me to stop going in there. i actually think that's the wrong approach, in context - i will continue coming here (and if they call the cops on me for being queer, we can take it the community and let them adjudicate such a thing - they won't win that debate), and i would even like to put out a call for queers throughout detroit to frequent the coney one more often. let's have big, queer parties there every weekend!

there's laws in place that say you can't do what he did, but that's secondary to the general point - you can't let religious groups move in and put down rules and restrictions like this. if the message i got was "i'm a muslim, and i don't like you, and i want you to leave" then my response is "i'm a queer atheist, and i'll go where i please, and if you don't like it then you can leave, yourself.".

so, let's get all the queers to the coney one, let's take this place over; let's make it ours.

when i was done berating him, i went to the symphony a little early, got a coffee and headed in to hear the pre-show program, by the conductor. we're going to split this off, tactically....

the liberals are supposed to do better than this