A friend once asked us, “What advice do you wish an older Gay person would given you when you were young?” This got us a thinking.  Here is something we would like to share.

    When you become a couple it is not about you & me anymore. It becomes about “us” or “n”  as in Mark n Carrie. We are not saying that you should loose your identity but that a third person is created “us/n”.  Life is much easier and a lot more fun if you let “us/n” do the cooking. Here is what we did. Over the years we cook back and forth for each other. Sometimes cooking old family traditions and other times new things. When we both agreed that the recipe was GREAT we would write it down in our “Best Dish” journal. All theses recipes then received the “us/n” stamp of approval.  Some times we would also write a note about the recipe too.  What fun to come home not knowing what to cook and to just pick up this book. Then to find ourselves saying, “That sounds good, we haven’t had that for a long time!” or “Remember that crazy party when…?”

    For many years we have wanted to write a cookbook for our nieces & nephews. With “Dishing with Mark and Carrie” we now have 10′s of 1,000′s of nieces and nephews across the world. Suddenly a light bulb went off. Since we already have our web site  www.mcfilm.co  why not write it on the site. Now we can share the progress weekly.  To be quite honest… by writing one or two recipes a week we actually might get the book written!!! LOL LOL  We invite you to join us on this journey of creating our book “The Rainbow Table.”

    We were at a auction with our good friend Marie Hall, a neighbor and good ol Southern Charm Mom.  A new classic Florida antique white pedestal dining room table with 6 matching chairs came up for sale. While Carrie was out getting Marie & Mark our beer soaked hot dogs, Mark bought the table. When Carrie came back with the hot dogs Marie leaned over a with a smile  laughing said, “How do you like that table Carrie? Mark just bought it!” Carrie was not amused but we took it home that night.

     The next day when Carrie came home around 5pm Mark was in the back yard with the chair seats removed and was busy spray painting the chairs. Carrie yelled, “What are you doing?!?!?”  Mark said, “You really didn’t think I like antique white chairs, did you?? 6 chairs 6 colors in the Gay Rainbow flag, it’s a natural.”  We both laughed and the chairs have been a big conversation piece ever since.

Visit www.MCFilm.co and click on The Rainbow Table.

After dinner we went out for a stroll down 5th Ave in GaYBOR/Ybor City.  The sun was just starting to set and the lights were coming on.  People forget how beautiful the homes are in GaYBOR/Ybor. Our first stop was at the Crowbar to see Bonnie & Tom. Out on the patio Tom was busy grilling hotdog for the big Annual 4th of July HOTDOG Contest! Inside Bonnie was looking beautiful, as always. We popped into Hamburger Mary’s to say hi. Dinning on the sidewalk was Frank Sinatra with his wife & friend. At New York New Ybor Pizza there were busy remolding. New store front & larger kitchen. Looks like they are keeping the Hot Guys!!! wink wink… At Bradley’s on 7th it looked like a Friday night.  Many groups of fun party people getting the party started.  Liquid TAMPA’s  party was “Candy Land USA” Hosted by DJ Power Infiniti. There was candy every where and we do mean every where!!! On the way to G.BAR we thought we were seeing double!!! A Flaming Orange Honda Element exactly like ours was parked next to us! G.BAR felt like a Wild Saturday Night. Dances on top of the bar everywhere. Miss Esme Russell Hosting a Crazy show and from NYC DJ Chris Cox!!!!

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    Tampa Bay has had a number of PFLAG’s (Parents & Friends of Lesbian & Gays) organizations start and close. But because of these 2 devoted individuals John & Nancy Desmond, they have started a new Tampa chapter,created, generated a great awareness to the Gay youth right here in Tampa. They have been active members of GaYBOR District Coalition and recently had booths at St, Pete Pride and the First Pride Event held at the VA Hospital in Tampa

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