Ogling Guys in Chaps and Wedding Rings

If at all possible, never turn down an unexpected invitation on a Saturday night.

Like one to the theater that comes little more than an hour before curtain time.

Especially when it results in delights like men wearing fishnet shorts and lines like, "Will you be my beard?"

Oh, yes, and a woman saying to me, "You know you want a lizard lick" with a salacious smile.

Triangle Players' production of "Devil Boys From Beyond" was in its last night of production, having extended the run.

The guy who co-wrote the play was in the audience because he'd seen such great reviews for Triangle's production.

The backdrop was from the original off-Broadway production.

And it was hysterical, high camp of the over-(but well-) acted variety with an all-male cast playing all the female roles.

When a spaceship from Pluto crashes into a Lizard Lick tool shed in 1957 ("Harry don't care if they were from Neptune or North Carolina"), Florida, a big city paper sends it crack team, a formerly-married reporter and her alcoholic photographer husband to discover the truth (because if they didn't get this story, the paper would fold and "there'd only be eight dailies in New York City").

The incredibly buff aliens wore shorts of various kinds, all tight and well-molded, including black fishnet shorts and short chaps, all to the audience's obvious delight.

The bar was selling a drink called the Lizard Lick and purchasing one got you a photo op with the two hot aliens after the show.

Hence the woman's leering comment to me when intermission began.

She practically licked her chops at me. Okay, I was flattered.

They were also selling outer space treats like Moon Pies and Milky Ways.

The aliens had come to earth from Pluto, a same-sex planet, as part of a tradition to use earth women to carry Plutonian spawn.

"Every seventeen years we travel to Virginia to breed. The Virginians are very welcoming."

This line got a huge laugh from the knowing Virginia audience (Virginia, welcoming to gays? Ha!).

They all live happily ever after once the aliens have their babies and they've shown the reporter that he's really gay (hence the comment and re-proposal to his wife, "Would you be my beard?" because he can't come out in 1957).

It was a night full of laughs.

Even after so satisfying an evening, I couldn't stop there, so I drove to Sprout where my theater companion met me.

As usual, there was a delayed start to the free show, but I wouldn't have let that stop me from staying to hear a dynamic guitar player and veteran of the 60s/70s UK psychedelic/folk scene and influence on other guitarists and musicians since the 90s.

Brit Michael Chapman didn't announce himself; instead he began playing alone on the stage and within seconds the room got quiet.

The lushness of sound this man coaxed from his guitar was room-filling.

He played amazing slide guitar using his wedding ring.

I was just wondering if he's really married or just devoted to his music.

Occasionally he sang, but for the most part, it was just the most beautiful sounds imaginable being coaxed from that guitar.

He used an effects pedal only on the very last song.

Every guitar geek and music-lover in the room was in awe.

A gaggle of girls began blathering four songs in and a guy went over and asked them to move to the other room.

Several of us applauded him.

After he finished, people couldn't buy his latest on vinyl fast enough.

Franzig, Richmond's uber-talented flamenco-style guitarist took the stage for a short set.

As always, Frank's flying fingers are unlike anyone else's around here.

He, too, used occasional vocals, but it was the dramatic flurry of notes and use of the guitar as a percussive instrument that make his sound so distinctive.

He'd thanked me for coming when I'd first walked in and, as always, I thanked him for playing.

For free, I might add.

It's not every Saturday night that begins with buff half-naked boys and ends with a British psych-guitar veteran knocking the socks off of a roomful of music lovers.

So I'll happily embrace one when it comes along.

And, no, I didn't get my picture taken with the aliens, tempted as I was.

Some things are better left to memory.