A Day at the Races
This was the scene at the Fairvilla Megastore Conch Republic Red Ribbon Bed Race down Duval Street in Key West, a benefit for AIDS Help, which took place this past Saturday. More than 20 businesses participated in this charity goodf allism, racing real beds which must be a certain size, have a mattress, four wheels that touch the ground, four runners pushing and be manned or womaned by one person.
Once you get past the rules the cool thing is outfitting your bed for maximum creativity – there was a coffin bed and a bong bed, and pirate beds, plus the ones sponsored by businesses (which was most of them) stayed true to their form. The Hog's Breath Saloon ferinstnace, made theirs into the biggest, ugliest swine this side of Time Bandits and the Shanna Key Irish Pub & Grill which ran a giant Guiness barrell down the street.
The Fairvilla team, “Iguana Kill You” was meticulously body painted as wicked sci-fi lizards and ran a sleek bed with a super aerodynmic rocket-like nose-cone (no phallic jokes, please). Other teams included a Rocky Horror send-up, a jungle themed bed with a young lady tethered to it ala Jessica Lange in “King Kong.” But one that knocked me off my judge’s bar stool for its memorability was a “Priscilla, Queen of the Desert”-style silver shoe, flanked by four drag queens all dressed in silver, like candy in big, shiny wrappers. One of them was a dead-ringer for Amanda LePore (in fact, I’d seen her on the parade route two days earlier, fell in love and deliberately winged some beads at her which she caught quite expertly).
Now, on a windy Key West day, if you’re running down the street in a kilt, you’re just asking fate to upskirt you and that’s precisely what happened to one of the runners from Shanna Key (on the left are two members of Shanna Key and one from Fairvilla; none of them are kilty). It was just a booty shot (and more’s the pity from what we heard later) but a nicely proportioned little bubble it was and we later saw two, then three, then four women huddled around this strapping young lad and getting their picture taken with him like this was Disney and he was Tigger. When they made the cute gesture of trying to get up to give us another piece of his arse he fooled them by throwing his Scottish skirt over the heads of one of the young ladies who had kneeled to pose for the photo; the scene had gotten so cluttered with admirers that she couldn’t have gotten into a horizontal shot without a Panoramic lens. We didn’t exactly hear her say “Who turned out the lights?” but we do hope she got to yank the switch.
The Fairvilla team, “Iguana Kill You” was meticulously body painted as wicked sci-fi lizards and ran a sleek bed with a super aerodynmic rocket-like nose-cone (no phallic jokes, please). Other teams included a Rocky Horror send-up, a jungle themed bed with a young lady tethered to it ala Jessica Lange in “King Kong.” But one that knocked me off my judge’s bar stool for its memorability was a “Priscilla, Queen of the Desert”-style silver shoe, flanked by four drag queens all dressed in silver, like candy in big, shiny wrappers. One of them was a dead-ringer for Amanda LePore (in fact, I’d seen her on the parade route two days earlier, fell in love and deliberately winged some beads at her which she caught quite expertly). Aside from the Iguanas paint job and the dance-off between the Rocky Horrors and the Desert Queens (below, left), the highlights in my silly ass opinion were wardrobe malfunctions. There were three. Two happened to the volumptuous drag queens of the Priscilla float (second photo from the bottom). The first was one of the ladies with a a low-slung cleavage that nearly vomited forth one of her fake boobies. The other was the Ms. LePore look-a-like …one of her girls made a brief but glorious accidental appearance that would, had it been televised, have lasted a split second and gotten her taken to the cleaners by the FCC. The most fun, though, was this:
Now, on a windy Key West day, if you’re running down the street in a kilt, you’re just asking fate to upskirt you and that’s precisely what happened to one of the runners from Shanna Key (on the left are two members of Shanna Key and one from Fairvilla; none of them are kilty). It was just a booty shot (and more’s the pity from what we heard later) but a nicely proportioned little bubble it was and we later saw two, then three, then four women huddled around this strapping young lad and getting their picture taken with him like this was Disney and he was Tigger. When they made the cute gesture of trying to get up to give us another piece of his arse he fooled them by throwing his Scottish skirt over the heads of one of the young ladies who had kneeled to pose for the photo; the scene had gotten so cluttered with admirers that she couldn’t have gotten into a horizontal shot without a Panoramic lens. We didn’t exactly hear her say “Who turned out the lights?” but we do hope she got to yank the switch.
In the end the best race was run by the folks at Fat Tuesdays You wouldn’t think a bar with a name like that would do anything in a Spartan manner, but Fat Tuesdays was more austere than a Quaker meeting hall; with a light-looking driver and four strong and serious runners they snatched victory from the jaws of style and took the big prize.
So Fat Tuesdays made the best time, but everyone else, me included, had the best time. I’m sure I’ll get back to Key West again one of these days. In the meantime, I’m betting Alice went to look for that rabbit hole every day of her life…wonder if she ever found it. If I was her I wouldn’t hesitate to go back to Wonderland.
Nice wrap-up. Next year, more boobie shots plskthx.
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