When I played in bands I always found the nervous energy good to get the set started.  I think its why we always started with uptempo numbers!

I haven't gotten "nervous" before a performance in a LONG time!  There's always great energy before a show (especially an opening), but I'm a long way from nervous -- usually excited!

Geoff, one should always start with an uptempo -- gotta grab 'em!  We have a saying around these parts:  "You gotta earn a ballad." 

Don - for the sake of accuracy, I wrote the bit you quoted, not Geoff.

Tom wrote:
"but I'm a long way from nervous -- usually excited!"

Makes sense. I think it's a very similar type of energy, though the latter is probably a wee bit more comfortable. ;)

 Makes me wonder, how many of our straight brethren in the forum have been accused of "looking" gay?

Hmm, some guy once tried to pick me up in the grocery store, kinda aggravated my girlfriend at the time, she was just down the aisle.

I was in a men's room at a  theater after the movie ended where I was... redepositing the giant tub of cola I had just consumed when another guy came in and took the urinal next to me. Not unexpected, but then he looked over and down and then up at me and smiled and started to talk about the movie (Princess Monoke). Asking what I thought of it and if I went to movies often and how he's heard about another movie like that in a theater downtown. A pleasant conversation usually but not while I am relieving myself. I was polite, washed my hands and then left the theater in a bit of a hurry.

The oddest part of it: I was insulted. Not because he thought I might be gay (or hoped I might be gay) but that he thought he was in the same league and would be able to pick me up. I was so pretty (back then) and he was bald, chubby, mustachioed and short. Like a two out of ten and he was trying to pick up a solid seven with eight aspirations.

...but that he thought he was in the same league and would be able to pick me up!

That made me laugh out loud!

 "looking" gay?  And, exactly what did that mean?

Current fashion, with clothes that look good together.

I tease the kid that lives with us that he needs to shop in the Adult Geranimal section. His fashion sense is pretty sad. One day his girlfriend and I joked with him because he had a striped polo and plaid cargo shorts, white socks and black tennis shoes. His response was "Look I dress funny because I'm a straight guy."

"Look I dress funny because I'm a straight guy."

Oh, then you've never met ME!  I'm a "function" over "form" guy any day of the week.  No fashion sense at all.  nada.  Eric bought me tight jeans, saying, "I can't go out with you in those baggy things of yours!  What would people think?"

This suddenly reminds me of the time I worked with the gayest-looking guy I ever met.

I mean, the guy was (a) very fit, (b) good looking, (c) came to work dressed to the nines and (d) wore an over-the-shoulder satchel/purse where he kept his lip gloss, wallet, brush, and even a tiny bottle of men's cologne. * His fastidiousness didn't bother me one bit although it irritated other people in the office.

Anyway, I was surprised to find out that the gayest-looking guy I ever met had bedded practically every woman in the office. I found out when I drove two of them home from a X-mas party and they spent the ride chatting about what a pig he was in bed.

METROSEXUAL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

* When I was in my 20's -- and same-sex attraction was less mainstream than is is today -- I actually went around with an oversized wallet which kinda looked like a girl's compact purse. My Italian girlfriend had picked it up for me and called it a "borselo". I miss that thing.