B-I-N-G-uh-O!

Let's get right to it! On the spur of the moment tonight, my friend Beth Lee called me to go with her to Drag Queen Bingo at a local boîte. For those of you who are shut-ins or Republicans, Drag Queen Bingo is where a drag queen calls out all the letter and number combinations for a few rounds of Bingo, interspersed with some lip-syncing and arm-flailing. She tells filthy jokes and demands cocktails and every now and then awards a prize to whomever managed to decipher the letter/number combinations she apparently yelled out in between filthy jokes. It's free and it's spectacular.

Our hostess this evening was the Pantomine Rage, Miss Bianca Paige. She has a voice that makes Harvey Fierstein sound like Dawn Upshaw...seriously. I waited tables with Bianca years and years ago (she was plain old Mark then) at a dive restaurant and I was flattered that tonight she almost remembered me. We made a lot of money back in the old days at that dump even though all we did that whole entire job was drink peppermint schnappes nonstop. She's now blind in one eye because she was having "safe sex" in her armpit with a gentleman acquaintance who, hmmm, climaxed into her eye and thus blinded her. I'm sure it was awful, but it's a funny story when she tells it, I swear, even though she had to wear an eye patch for like a year. MOM! You can quit reading now!

I won the second game. The prize was two tickets to a Nashville Sounds baseball game. Yes, a Wild Turkey-drinking drag queen awarded me two tickets to a baseball game. I'm sure I'll get called out onto the, uh, mound and recognized. I do like a baseball game, so that worked out. Other prizes throughout the night included edible pasties, Virgin bubble bath ("It grows your lips back together!") and some other borderline filthy items. I was surprised how tense Bingo can make a person. I've never wanted to hear N-41 so badly in my whole life. Also, you got a free beer every time she called out "O-69," which she managed to do about four times every round. We drank a lot of that and also Maker's Mark.


You'll be surprised to learn that this is not my first run in with Drag Queen Bingo. A few years ago, I went to visit my friends Jeff and David in Washington DC, just after 9-11, and we went to some crazy-assed steakhouse where the exact same thing was going on. That night, I won the first game and received a hideous ceramic napkin holder, which I insisted Jeff and David keep. They subsequently moved to Tulsa, where I'm sure it's the chicest thing within the city limits. ANYWAY. Standing date now, anyone who comes to town on a Tuesday: you're going to see a sexually-blinded one-eyed drag queen yell Bingo numbers for a few hours. Consider yourself warned blessed.

(photos: Beth Lee)