Thanks for ruining my life, Clay Aiken.

It is not something I talk about very much any more, because I have grown and changed, bu I used to be crazy into Clay Aiken. As in, I have seen him fourteen times in concert. (To be fair to me, several of those concerts were free.) Despite this fact, I was not into him enough to be considered a "Claymate." There are people a little more diehard than me, believe it or not. Still, I enjoyed the music, found him to be extremely charismatic in performance, and had a lot of disposable income at the time. That was before, you know, people started saying we were headed towards another Great Depression sometime around March 2009. (Just in time for my birthday!)

The point is: Clay Aiken has come out of the closet.

I am not really concerned for myself romantically; I mean, we all saw this one coming, I have had several confirmations of this fact through the grapevine, and I personally have moved on to men who will ignore me and/or misuse me on a more firsthand basis, so it's not like I was scribbling "Mel Aiken" on my geometry notebook when I got this news. Rather, what I am worried about is the ribbing I will be taking from many people about being extremely attracted to a gay dude. (He's pretty! And he sings so pretty! And he's so non-threatening!) I know several of my friends will e-mail me immediately upon seeing next week's cover of People, and all I am going to get is hell, hell, hell.

Look, there is no shame in wanting a piece of a gay dude. Have you seen Neil Patrick Harris? I have. I loved Doogie Howser, and I won't watch sitcoms anymore, but I still think he is supes cute. (And non-threatening!) I am not ashamed to say it. So what's the problem here? Again: I can think of several people off the top of my head who are going to be real mean to me. And I will cry.

I am going to pour some of my cosmo out on the ground and listen to "Measure of a Man" for you, though, Clay Aiken. You are so brave.