Customers have been asking about shipping more frequently lately. Although the web site has always stated on the Shipping & Returns page that we ship by US Mail — almost always by Priority Mail — that information hasn’t always been clear to customers when they are checking out. Addressing that, I’ve added a couple of lines to the page where you select your Shipping Method to say more explicitly that US Mail is what we use.

Just to take this a little further:

• Almost everything is shipped by Priority Mail if it’s going to a US shipping address.
• If your order subtotal, before shipping and tax, is at least $50, you get Priority Mail shipping within the US for free, unless you have ordered a spray can.
• Orders with spray cans (e.g., Maximum Impact, Thunderbolt) are not shipped by Priority Mail (except once or twice by accident). According to the Postal Service, these types of pressurized containers are supposed to be sent by surface mail.
• If your spray can order is over $50, I’ll ship it for free, but I can’t ship it by Priority.
• Very small and light orders, such as a single hanky, will occasionally be sent by First Class.
• If your order has one or more items out of stock, the items which are in-stock will usually be sent by Priority Mail right away. The remaining items may be sent by Priority Mail or by First Class or surface mail depending on weight, cost, and other factors. Of course, I’ll work with you, and if you need your backordered item right away I’ll do what it takes to get it to you as quickly as I can.
• I discontinued Express Mail as an option on the web site because (a) it was seldom used; and (b) when it was used, I lost money on it. If you need something that quickly, let me know in your order comment and tell me that you pre-authorized additional charges for Express Mail. I’ll calculate the additional charge and let you know what it is when I ship the order.

Complicated, isn’t it? This is an evolving process. If you have suggestions for improvements, let me know.

Here’s a Happy Post-Father’s Day greeting to all you Daddies and Sons out there. For those of you who live in a city where Father’s Day coincides with Gay Pride Day, I hope you made the most of it! Be proud of who you are. Be proud of your Son; he needs it. Be proud of your Daddy; he appreciates it. And if you are a biological or adoptive father, you have a special gift and a special opportunity to be proud.

I was in San Antonio for my mother’s eighty-third birthday on Friday, and I took some time this weekend to visit my own biological father. He is eight-two years old, and he has been living in a nursing home for the last several years. Among many ailments, he has Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. He doesn’t remember very much, and what he does is remember is more from many years ago than from the recent years, much less recent days.

Dad was a pilot in the Air Force for many years, and in the Army Air Corps before there even was an Air Force. His years in the military total thirty-two. In our visit, I mentioned to him that he’d been retired for thirty-one years now. In other words, he’s been retired now almost as long as he was in the service. He was amazed to hear that.

He doesn’t remember any of this now, but in retirement Dad went back to school. Growing up on a farm and then in small town Appalachia during the depression, he went right out of high school into the Army. That was during the war years in the Forties. He was fortunate enough not to be sent to Europe; I’ve never really known why. After the war he was demobilized, as so many servicemen were at the time, but he rejoined the Army the first chance he got and was sent to pilot school and OCS. Way back then, you didn’t need a college degree to become an officer, and it may have been easier for enlisted men to find their way up through the ranks.

Dad was in Korea, and later flew the big bombers out of California and North Dakota in the fifties and sixties. That’s where I was born, up on the high plains. A couple years later, he flew big cargo planes out of Japan into places like Saigon, Da Nang, and Bangkok. We were lucky that our three years there were up before the war really heated up, but I know that Dad plane was under fire a few times. He later flew out of Delaware to Europe and the Middle East, then was based in San Antonio – the second home-town for most Air Force people – and then “flew a desk” in Guam, Korea again, and even with a missile wing back up in North Dakota.

Given his background, some of my friends have been surprised that Dad always accepted me being gay. I came out to him when he visited me when I was living in Washington, D.C. in the mid-1980s, when I was in my early twenties. There was no condemnation from him, no judgment, just acceptance and many, many questions. He wanted to know how you knew you were gay. He wanted to know how you knew whether someone else was gay. I took him and his then-girlfriend – my parents lived apart many years – to a gay bar and restaurant on P Street. He enjoyed it, she didn’t know what to make of it.

One thing that I remember from our talks then was a comment he made about what happened when I was born. I was the last of five children, and I came as a surprise after my mother had had a couple of miscarriages. They weren’t expecting or ready for another child, and my mother did have doubts and misgivings. Dad said he told her, “This one is a gift. This one is going to be special. This one is going to make us proud.”

That was Dad’s message to me when I told him I was gay. He was still proud of me. I was still special. I was still his son.

He doesn’t really know me know. Once a strong and vital man, he’s now in a wheelchair, small, weak, his lap covered in a blanket. He looks like someone else. He doesn’t remember where I live. He isn’t sure how many children he and my mom had together, or what their names are. But, with a little prodding and prompting, he remembers, or at least he says he does. Maybe it’s just for a couple minutes. But he was happy to see me, glad that I came to visit, wishes me well.

Looking back, yes, I’m proud. Of him. Of me. Of all of us.

My mother turns 83 on Friday, June 16, and I’m taking some time off to go and visit her in San Antonio.

What this means for my customers is that there will be an extra day when I will not be processing and shipping your orders from this web site. If you order by 8 a.m. Central Time on Thursday, I’ll be able to handle your order before I leave town that day. If you order after that, I won’t handle your order until I’m back on Monday, June 19.

What this means for me is the first time I’ve seen my mother since last August. With Freddie’s various illnesses, and with a business to run here, I don’t have many chances to get away from home. Weeks go by without me leaving the Island.

My mother and I exchange email a couple of times a day. The last few years she’s been hospitalized frequently with various heart and lung conditions. If I don’t get an email from her in the morning, I’ve learned to wait until the afternoon. If I still don’t have an email from her by afternoon, I call her. And if she doesn’t answer, then I know it’s time to call the hospital.

Lately I’ve been having this imaginary conversation with my mom. I picture her saying something like this:

So how’s your business going?

Oh, o.k. I get by.

And just what is it that you do again? I know you do that programming for web sites… Anything I would have heard of?

Well, Mom, it’s, uh, one of those online dating sites. (The client is actually a network of gay hook-up and porn sites owned by a friend.)

And you’ve got this web site of your own? What’s that about?

Umm. It’s a sort of gift shop. We sell… toys. Yeah, toys. And special clothing and “jewelry” for “parties.”

Oh, I see. And what’s your most popular item?

Well, Mom, you’d be surprised. It’s actually “video head cleaner.” It’s amazing, with all the DVDs and computer high-tech video things, so many guys still have their old VHS players. There’s one or two who even have Beta. (There’s a infamous hot w/s photoset of a model named “Beta.” It’s been floating around the Net for years…)

Imagine. I haven’t seen one of those in the longest time!

Yeah. I think they’re mainly older guys like me. We came of age in the 70s and 80s, and we’re kind of old school, kind of nostalgic. We like to try to “do it” like we did back then…

You’re not talking about videos, son. (She’s a sharp old gal; it’s clearly not a question)

No, Mom, I’m not.

Some popular items are now back in stock. KIX is in from our European vendor. Also check out the Colt Expandable Butt Plug and the Colt Anal Douche. And, although Rush is sold out this morning, we expect a new shipment in either this afternoon or Monday, so if you want Rush, we’ll be able to get it to you very soon.

Update, Friday Afternoon: FedEx just arrived with more Rush and Jungle Juice Platinum.  We’ve also just started a FREE SHIPPING promotion for pride, and we’re ready for the weekend!

Perhaps you’ve heard the old joke question: “What’s black and white and red all over?” The answer is “a newspaper,” which is “read” (not “red”). For me, the joke has a different color since I’ve started recycling my old newspapers into packing material for many of the shipments I send out.

Why am I doing this? It’s green and it’s green.

Green, first, in that it saves me money (folding green?) that I had spent buying those packing “peanuts” at the office supply store. In the past, I had been recycling “peanuts” from shipments that I received from vendors, but for the last few months there haven’t been enough. Either the vendors don’t use “peanuts” as much any more, or else I’m shipping out more packages. In any case, the cost of buying those “peanuts” hits the bottom line. I’d rather find another way to pack your products without having to raise prices.

Green, in another sense, comes from recycling the papers. Our Island does not have a regular recycling program. Although there is a central facility that receives newspaper, cardboard, and other such recyclable waste, there is no curbside pickup like there is in many larger urban areas. The cost for the city to pick it is up is said to be prohibitive. The cost and time of making a special trip to the recycling facility is also prohibitive, for me — I need to stay here and work on your orders, after all.

My compromise is to use the newspaper as a packing material in place of the “peanuts,” at least most of the time. When you get a package from GayHankies.com, you’ll also be likely to get a little piece of the news from Houston, Galveston, and Southeast Texas. Enjoy your reading.

Noted briefly, we’ve just received a partial shipment from Europe including most of our re-supply of KIX and TRANSS (TRANCE). Supplies are very limited, but all backorders have been filled. More KIX should be arriving next week. Order now — no “operators are standing by,” but the web site is always here.