Lamar and Donald are two black men in a 10-year relationship. Their partnership is “happy and good” but Lamar is concerned that the spark may be dying because Donald is not hitting the gym enough.

“I’ve told him, from the beginning, that I’m very turned on by a body that is physically fit,” Lamar says.

“For the record, I’m not 300 pounds,” Donald snaps back.

This couple is putting their personal problems on television for everyone one to see -- well to hear. Lamar and Donald are one of the many couples who have agreed to have their therapy sessions recorded and re-enacted with puppets in exchange for free advice on Logo’s new series Felt.

The brainchild of producers Maris Berzins, Diana Nguyen and Micah Fitzerman-Blue, Felt also features a dyke couple in their 30s who are suffering from “lesbian bed death” and Christians in their 20s who think they jumped into matrimony too soon.

“Puppets have a charm to them; they’re cute, they make things fun,” consulting producer Kirk Thatcher, who is an alum of another hilarious puppet show, Crank Yankers, told The New York Times. “Part of it is the physicality. They don’t have legs. A puppet with a dildo is funny, because it’s flopping around. ”

Queer choir Tone Cluster aims to address the realities of bullying with its upcoming concert, which will feature students from two Ottawa high schools.

Tone Cluster previously dedicated a song to Jamie Hubley, who committed suicide in 2011 after being bullied for his sexual orientation, and the choir’s musical director, Kurt Ala-Kantti, says an entire concert focused on bullying is a natural progression for the collective.

Titled Words, the concert will feature selections from Lady Gaga and Oscar Peterson.

The choir performed at Nepean High School earlier this month, and although Ala-Kantti was told the students were “a tough crowd,” the performance, which included students and choir members discussing their experiences with bullying, was well received, he says.

Students from Nepean High School and St Peter’s Catholic High School will join Tone Cluster on stage for Words.

“There will be 125 in the choir,” Ala-Kantti says. “It should be a great, big sound.”

Village adult store Wilde’s is renovating and refurbishing to mark its 20th anniversary in business.

The front of the boutique is completely revamped, and owner Doug Saunders-Riggins says customers can expect a top-to-bottom transformation by summer’s end.

“We’re going to do it in stages,” he says. “Wilde’s is celebrating its 20th anniversary this year as a business, so I wanted to give the store a fresh look.”

Wilde's

367 Bank St 

Organizers have announced the lineup for this summer’s Arboretum Arts Festival.

Queer Polaris Prize-winner Owen Pallett is the featured performer. Arboretum founder Rolf Klausener says organizers are “excited and honoured” to have Pallett as the headliner.

Now in its second year, the festival will expand from a single-day celebration to a more focused two-day event. “This year the Polaroid has come a little bit sharper into focus, and we are starting to understand what facets of the city we are trying to bolster,” Klausener says.

The festival’s chef showcase will see chefs serving up their creations on a concert stage, rather than set up as vendors. “Chefs get a one-hour set like musicians,” Klausener says. “This year what we’ll do is have a small-portion set. Six chefs are being highlighted.”

Klausener says this year's musical lineup is more eclectic than last year's and includes more hip hop, experimental and electronic acts. He credits the help of Westfest founder, and current Xtra Ottawa cover girl, Elaina Martin with logistics.

“Elaina has been a big hero of mine in the city. When she started, she was one of the first independent multidisciplinary arts festivals with a large goal. She’s been a huge inspiration,” he says.

Additonal performers include Jim Bryson, Holy Fuck and Sarah Neufeld.

Visit the festival’s Facebook page for more info.

Arboretum Festival

Fri, Aug 16 and Sat, Aug 17 

Dutch duo W&W will shock Tulip Festival audiences this week at Ottawa City Hall as part of Electrik Tulipe.

The twosome is made up of Willem van Hanegem Jr and Wardt van der Harst, who met in 2007.

Their first single, “Mustang,” was an instant hit and was embraced by world-renowned DJs like Armin Van Buuren and Tiësto.

Electrik Tulipe is being promoted as a precursor to this summer’s Escapade Festival. Last year, one of Escapade’s organizers and, coincidentally, a former nightclub co-worker of mine, stole $600,000 and was apprehended in Aruba.

Montreal-born DJ Ariyan will open the event.

W & W, Lift Off

Electrik Tulipe

Thurs, May 16, 6-11pm

Festival Plaza, Ottawa City Hall, 110 Laurier Ave W

$25, tickets available at Norml Clothing (184 Rideau St) or dnalive.ca

16+ event

Marie Robertson, of the Ottawa Senior Pride Network (OSPN), is encouraging our city’s queers to slip into their dancing shoes.

Saturday, May 11 is the OSPN’s third Vintage Queers Dance, and Robertson says the event is always a place where gay men, lesbians, bisexuals, allies and trans folks can converge in a friendly atmosphere.

“The main attraction of the Vintage Queers Dance is definitely the music,” she says. “Our DJ plays music from the late '60s, '70s, '80s and early '90s.”

From Al Green to KC and the Sunshine Band, the Vintage Queers Dance will feature “the music that we seniors remember from our heydays in the bar scene,” Robertson adds.

Attendance has ballooned since the first event, and a fourth dance is already on the books for Oct 5.  

Vintage Queers Dance

Sat, May 11, 8pm

Good Companions Centre, 670 Albert St

Advance tickets are $20 at Venus Envy and After Stonewall; $25 at the door

Centretown Community Health Centre (CCHC) and 8-80 Cities’ revitalization of Somerset Street’s Dundonald Park kicks off this Saturday with Spring into Fun.

The day of casual events will include art by Moods Expressed, a group of artists with mental health issues; blood pressure readings, courtesy of CCHC; and book walk, where a book’s pages are scattered throughout the park.

Additionally, the gardening club, Friends of Dundonald will meet at 1:30pm.

“Much like last year, community members and groups are planning activities throughout the spring and summer. We’re just kicking off, so we expect more activities planned in June and July,” CCHC communications officer Émilie Sartoretto says.

Although CCHC played an integral role in the park’s transformation, now that their joint report with 8-80 Cities is released, various organizations will take the lead on future projects at the park, Sartoretto says.

Read CCHC and 8-80 Cities' report on Dundonald Park.  

Spring into Fun at Dundonald Park

Sat, May  11

10:30am-4pm

For any queer who was ever called a “cream puff” as an insult, on May 8 you can take your creamy self to the east end to sample delicacies from around the globe.

Attendees of the Desserts of the World Festival can nibble on everything from lopes to baklava. Spokesperson Marie-Joelle LeBlanc says Ottawa-area queers will revel in the rich atmosphere.

“It is set up as a lounge-type venue with Social’s resident DJ mixing jazz beats all evening,” she says. “It’s more adult-oriented, although the event is all about desserts, and children are welcome. The bar will be opened, allowing for our adult crowd to pair wine and chocolate.”

Local bakeries Delightful Taste and Fidelice will display their specialities, chocolate-strawberry ganache and croquet-noisette, respectively.

This year’s theme is La Dolce Vita.

“The Desserts of the World Festival is a celebration of life and culture. We believe that we can all connect if we find a common ground, and what better way to do this than by indulging in a variety of desserts,” LeBlanc says. “We live our philosophy, La Dolce Vita, by sharing some sweet treats from around the globe on the week leading up to Mother’s Day.”

“It’s also a charity event in support of St-Mary’s Home, who have helped young mothers and fathers with their children for the past 80 years. [This comprises] the life part of La Dolce Vita.”

Larger-portion desserts and beverages are available for purchase.

Desserts of the World Festival

Wednesday, May 8 5-10pm

Shenkman Arts Centre, 245 Centrum Blvd (next to Place Orleans)

$20

This week is dubbed International Clitoris Awareness Week by Clitoraid, an organization that claims to be building a “pleasure hospital” in Burkina Faso to restore the clitorises of victims of genital mutilation.

“There are many goals for Clitoraid. First, to stop female genital mutilation, but also, one of the goals is to have the clitorises of those women rebuilt,” Clitoraid volunteer Nadia Salois told Xtra at the Ottawa edition of Sexapalooza in February.

“There’s a French doctor that found a technique to rebuild the clitoris because the nerves are still inside the body; there’s a way to pull the nerves out and rebuild the clitoris and still have the sensation. Since it’s still inside and is pulled out to the outside the sensation can be found again, and we can help these women to enjoy their clitoris.”

If Clitoraid’s claims are true, I fully support their endeavours. However, I am a bit skeptical as Clitoraid is a project of the Raëlians, a UFO religion that claimed to have cloned a human being in 2002.

Spacemen aside, there are groups who are opposed to Clitoraid, as they believe that by restoring a victim of female genital mutilation, also known as female circumcision or excision, you degrade the victim and send the message that victims who cannot access “restoration” are incomplete.

Salois disagrees with groups like Feminists Challenging Clitoraid.

“One of . . . [our goals] . . . is to restore the integrity, the femininity of these women and to help them feel whole again. It’s not just rebuilding a clitoris, but it’s helping them, as well, to feel that they are a woman and to enjoy life as a woman, as a human being first but as a woman as well. We accompany them, as well, psychologically,” Salois says. “If your clitoris was cut at, say, five years old and many years after you restore your clitoris, it’s not just having your clitoris restored. It’s really just to help them feel like a woman, not make them feel like we’re just putting a little piece of their body back. It’s really to get that integrity back, that feeling of being a woman and being feminine, to enjoy your sexual life. It’s more than just putting back a piece of skin.”

Construction on the hospital will be complete in October, Salois says.

On Saturday, May 4, comic-book stores across North America will hand out complimentary comics as part of Free Comic Book Day.

Bank Street’s The Comic Book Shoppe will participate, with the stipulation of one comic per customer. Owner Rob Spittall, who famously removed works by homophobic author Orson Scott Card from his shelves, has recently seen an upswing of gay characters in comics.

There are more openly gay, bisexual and trans people in the world, and this is, and should be, reflected in comics, he says. Spittall particularly enjoyed storylines featuring the first gay character in the Archie universe, Kevin Keller.

“They’ve done some fantastic stories with him. [In one storyline] Kevin got a note slipped into his locker from another student in the school, saying, ‘I’m really proud of you for coming out. I’m not there yet, but I think I will be. I’d like to be your date for prom.’ At the end the guy didn’t have the courage to stand up for fear of the backlash. They are dealing with realistic topics that people are encountering on a daily basis,” Spittall says. “They are not glorifying it in any way. They are putting a realistic tone on it. They’re not showing everybody making out and having sex on the pages just because they are of a different sexual orientation.”

On the topic of race and comics, Spittall says he has noticed a pattern amongst comic-book buyers.

“If I’m selling the Green Lantern comic and Hal Jordan is not in the story, but John Stewart, who is the black Green Lantern, is in the story, my sales are down by about 15 to 20 percent. Do I think my customers are racist? No. But the numbers show it that way. I don’t think they realize that their buying habits are different. The same thing happened with an issue of Avengers vs X-Men. One of the issues was focusing on Black Panther and Storm, who are a married couple in the comic books,” Spittall says. “Issue 1 sold 65 copies; Issue 2 I sold 55. For Issue 3, Storm and Black Panther are on the cover; I sold 35.”

Spittall says sales went back up for Issue 4, which didn’t feature characters of colour on the cover.

“So my sales dropped because it was Black Panther and Storm. Normally, you’ll see a progressive decrease as the issues go on. In this case, here is a downright drop that is two black characters on the cover and my sales dropped because of that.”

For a list of free comics offered on May 4 by participating stores, including issues of Batman and The Walking Dead, visit the official Free Comic Book Day website.

The Comic Book Shoppe

228 Bank St