Gay Place

COME TOGETHER Oh, you've heard us chirp about this before: The community is only as strong as its most slippery links, and holding those links together is crucial to moving our big gay agenda (um, survival?) forward. Now some will argue that "community" is the wrong way to approach the vastly diverse and gelatinously quivering mass that is all of the letters of the LGBTQI, etc. alphabet soup. Some might even argue that some reps of certain letters have nothing in common with the others, save for that pesky outlaw sexuality thang. Well, all's I know is that we need each other. Our rainbow of fruit flavors is made up of strata, while separate and varied, all similarly qualified to speak to the common issues of marginalia. So how to bring it all together? HRC-Austin's Tim Hanson, along with counselor/straight ally Annabelle Arteaga, is taking a crack at it tonight, hosting the LGBT Community Alliance, an assemblage of more than 40 LGBT groups, power brokers, and community quakers. All the stalwarts (AIDS Services of Austin, ALLGO, Equality Texas, Out Youth, etc.), sassy connectors (Foodies, Q Boyz, Midtowne Spa, etc.), smarty pants (UT, Texas State), allies (PFLAG, Atticus, etc.), club kids (Rusty, Sister's, 'Bout Time, etc.), big names (Bettie, Randi, Spelman, etc.), as well as some li'l ones (yours truly) will be there. How about you? (See Thursday.)