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LGBT Senior’s Podcast Pick: UNCLOSETED with Spencer Macnaughton – How America’s Foster System Is Failing Trans Kids (YouTube)
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Mark McNease’s Fearsome Fiction Podcast: Night Flight to Murder Town – A Marshall James Thriller (Chapters 28 – 30)
In these three chapters of Night Flight to Murder Town, Marshall James finds himself waking up on the couch of Colin Griffin — a sharp-witted escort who becomes his unlikely confidant — and paying the price of admission: the truth. Marshall lays out his history, from his Hollywood past to the body he found that morning, and Colin listens without calling the police. Meanwhile, in a counterpoint chapter set in the present, Marshall and his partner Boo enjoy a deceptively quiet afternoon in Lambertville and New Hope — a brief, tender interlude that feels worlds away from what’s unfolding in New York City.
Back in the past, the stakes suddenly escalate. A breaking news report out of Manhattan reveals that Senator Daniel Roth — the powerful man Trent Stoffer had been secretly involved with — has fallen twelve stories to his death from his apartment near the United Nations. With his old flame dead and a senator now gone, Marshall grows convinced that his presence in New York is no accident. He’s been here before — marked as a patsy, caught in someone else’s design. And so he does what Marshall James always does: he heads straight for the scene of the crime.
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Savvy Senior: Still Working at 65? Here’s How to Handle Medicare
By Jim Miller
Dear Savvy Senior,
My wife and I are approaching 65, but I’m still working and have good health coverage through my employer. Do we need to enroll in Medicare at this point?
–Almost 65
Dear Almost,
If you or your spouse is still working past age 65 and have health insurance through your job, you may be able to delay enrolling in Medicare without a late enrollment penalty. However, the rules depend largely on the size of your employer.
First, a quick refresher: Remember that original Medicare has two parts. Part A, which covers hospital care and is premium-free for most people. And Part B, which covers doctor visits, lab tests, and outpatient care and has a monthly premium of $202.90 in 2026. Higher-income individuals (over $109,000) and couples (over $218,000) pay more.
If you’re already receiving Social Security, you’ll automatically be enrolled in Parts A and B when you turn 65, and your Medicare card will arrive in the mail. It will include instructions on how to return it if you have employer coverage that allows you to delay Part B.
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LGBT Senior’s News On the Positive Side with Cora Berke
Cora Berke News on the Positive Side- by Cora Berke
Texas Patrons Rally to Save Gay Bar
“Alone we can do so little, together, we can do so much.” -Helen Keller
Galveston Texas, also known as “The Queen City of the Gulf”, is a barrier island on the Gulf Coast of Texas. During the 19th. century it was a major port and haven for Caribbean pirates. One such pirate was Jean Lafitte, who started a colony in Galveston in 1817. Among the many romantic pirate tales, his name remains legendary and some believe there is still buried treasure on the island.
It is no wonder that when Cal LeBlanc opened a bar in Galveston in 1965, he named it “Lafitte’s”. Five years later the bar was sold to Robert Mainor who changed the name to “Robert’s Lafitte” and welcomed the LGBTQ+ community in honor of Stonewall. Robert Mainor passed away in 2022. The bar has been a mainstay in Galveston and is the oldest gay bar in Texas.
Fast forward to May 2026. An inspection of the bar revealed that it was not up to current city codes. The bar, ceiling and plumbing were cited for violations and given 30 days to either be repaired or Robert’s Lafitte would be closed.
Terry Fuller, bartender and events coordinator said, “They’re things that cost quite a bit of money. Robert’s Lafitte has always been a mixed crowd, gay, straight, bi, trans, people of all walks of life. It’s the oldest continuously running gay bar in Texas, and there’s so much rich history.”
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Mark McNease’s Fearsome Fiction Special Edition: Short Story ‘Jawbone’ from 5 of a Kind
Today in this special feature of the Fearsome Fiction Podcast we’re offering another short story from Mark McNease’s collection, ‘Five of a Kind.’
Jawbone tells the story of young Richard who was eighteen years old when a head-on collision on a snowy Indiana road took the lower half of his face. He survived — and that, in many ways, was the cruelest part.
We Richard Krump across the decades after his accident: the surgeries that promised normalcy and delivered nothing, the friends who never showed up to his homecoming party, the little girl in a drugstore who gave him his name, and the slow, steady retreat of everyone he ever loved — until only his books, his silence, and finally his paintings remained.
A haunting, deeply human story about disfigurement, isolation, and the particular cruelty of surviving intact on the inside while the world refuses to see past the outside. Jawbone begins where a young man’s life as he knew it ends.
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True Crime Tuesdays – A Fearsome Fiction Feature: Shot By a Killer Clown
True Crime Tuesdays — A Fearsome Fiction Feature: Shot by a Killer Clown
It was Memorial Day weekend, 1990, in Wellington, Florida. Marlene Warren answered her front door to find a clown holding flowers and balloons — and was shot in the face at point-blank range. The clown got back in the car and drove away. Marlene died two days later.
The case had a suspect almost immediately. It had circumstantial evidence. It had motive. What it didn’t have — for twenty-seven years — was enough to make an arrest. This week on True Crime Tuesdays, we follow one of the most bizarre cold cases in American history from a quiet Florida neighborhood in 1990 all the way to a courthouse in 2023, and a prison release that left a victim’s family without the justice they deserved.
Fearsome Fiction is produced by MadeMark Media. New episodes every Tuesday.
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The Twist Podcast 327: Supreme Disgrace, Met Gala Fail, and The Twist On a Hot Tin Room
Welcome to The Twist, episode 327. Mark and Rick take on the news from a crazy week, finger wag the Supreme Court, dish on the Met Gala, and reveal some unknown facts about Tennessee Williams.
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This Week’s Survey: What Spring Moment Do You Most Enjoy?
Which spring moment do you most enjoy?
The first farmers/outdoor market of the season
Putting the heavy coats and clothes away till next time
That one perfect spring morning when everything smells like possibility
Seeing everyone outside again after a long winter
Name your own in the comments -
Mark McNease’s Fearsome Fiction Podcast: Genre Classic ‘The Mystery of the Yellow Room’ by Gaston Leroux (Chapters 14 – 29_)
Welcome to Fearsome Fiction, the podcast that brings you mysteries, thrillers, rare gems, and a weekly True Crime Tuesday.
Today we conclude our journey through one of the greatest locked-room mysteries ever written, with chapters 14 through 29. Published in 1907, Gaston Leroux’s The Mystery of the Yellow Room set the standard for a genre that would captivate readers for generations. A young woman is found brutally attacked inside a room locked from the inside. No one could have entered. No one could have escaped. And yet someone did both. Following the investigation is the brilliant young journalist and amateur detective Joseph Rouletabille — one of fiction’s most ingenious and overlooked heroes — as he unravels a mystery that seems to defy every law of logic and nature. Now for your listening pleasure, the remaining chapters of Gaston Leroux’s ‘The Mystery of the Yellow Room.’
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LGBT Senior’s Weekly Writing Prompt: Two’s Company
This week’s writing prompt / dance with a partner do-si-do
I’ve been doing more writing exercises with index cards. I used this one today in a journaling group and it’s a lot of fun. But it does requires at least two people! (We did it with three in Monday’s workshop.)
One person writes an opening sentence establishing a character in a situation. Then you alternate — one person writes a sentence beginning with “Fortunately…” and the other writes the next beginning with “Unfortunately…” and you keep going back and forth 3 or 4 times, building an increasingly wild story together.
Example:
- “Maria decided to rob a bakery at 3am.”
- “Fortunately, the door was unlocked.”
- “Unfortunately, so was the bear cage next door.”
- “Fortunately, the bear loved croissants…”
It’s great for a workshop because it teaches cause and effect, narrative momentum, and the value of surprise, and it’s entertaining. At the end you can each read the full story aloud. We did two rounds, switching who writes “Fortunately” and who writes “Unfortunately.”
