I Feel Gay (Not that there's anything wrong with that)

And I'm feeling it in the correct usage for the word. I'm happy. I'm also in what is classified as a "domestic partnership", for the first time in almost 6 years.

What brought this about? Health insurance. My company is going through the usual open enrollment and for the first time in history they're offering insurance for domestic partners. I've never had need for this, as I've only lived with relatives and college roommates, but this year, it's coming in handy. With Chef starting school in January, our need for joint insurance has made itself abundantly clear. So having that option has made me gay (happy).

However, classifying Chef as my domestic partner makes me feel gay. The requirements to do so are written to be somewhat specific, not too stringent and very non-offensive. In fact, one of the terms includes the phrase "engaged in a committed relationship of mutual caring and support." Not exactly how or where I'd choose to profess my support and mutual caring of Chef, but whatever works.

The last time I was in a "domestic partnership," it was with college roommates when filling out a census form about 6 years ago. It was true in the broadest sense of the terms and hopefully helped balance the scales a little for all of those people who denied their "domestic partnerships." Plus we thought the phrase was funny in its effort to non-offensive.

On another note, has anyone else noticed those "top ten" lists for search engines? It seems like every one from google to yahoo to msn, has a top list. Have you ever looked at it and wondered "How the hell did he/she/that make it up there?" Sometimes I wonder if there are groups of fan clubs or people that decide "today we're making our move" and the proceed to hit one specific search engine a number of times so that it registers.

Case in point: "Jodie Sweetin." The lovable "Stephanie Tanner" from Full House. For some reason last week, her name was on the msn top searchable terms list for about 3 days. I tried to search for any news on her and come up with nothing.

I want to be a search engine star. Something with my name on the msn homepage. Or perhaps we should try to make a search term famous. Something like "red rocket." Anybody got any suggestions?