me and Milky White

This evening, I dressed up as a gay cow to get free food.

So Chick-Fil-A, fast food restaurant, is run by people who donate large amounts of money to anti-gay causes. They also have a Cow Appreciation Day, where anyone wearing cow paraphernalia gets a free entree, and anyone who dresses up like a cow gets a free meal.

And a woman organized a Gay Cow Appreciation Day. And I do mean organized. I bought rainbow-striped fabric and cut out my own spots, but she had spots available in all colors, stickytape, masks, ears on headbands (and boy did those ears look good on everyone), tails, the works.

My costume was black shoes, white tights-- I tore a hole in them putting them on so I didn't worry about wrecking them-- a white button-up shirt that kept coming unbuttoned, and my knee-length black skirt, rolled up like a Catholic schoolgirl's. Gotta tell you, those schoolgirls have skills. It was hard to get the skirt short enough initially, though it did keep creeping upward throughout the evening.

And for the cow portion? Rainbow-striped fabric spots on shoulder, back, hip, and legs... and one Phantom-esque half-mask. Ears, provided by the organizer. A cowbell made from a yellow Solo cup and hanging from a rainbow ribbon; I later added a little sign for Gay Cow Appreciation Day*. And my favorite! I could not shut up about my tail. I used a tasseled curtain tieback with a rainbow-ribbon bow on it and hung it from a loop of twine around my waist. Not attached to any clothing because let's be honest, that was not a load-bearing skirt.

There were four knitters there, including me, and plenty of other people. We just hung out a while, got our food, milled around a bit, talked to people, took pictures. One woman explained the whole thing to a bystander while I played with the bystander's toddler (cow spots: great toys). We gave cow names to the cashiers at Chick-Fil-A because they asked us to; mine was Swishytail.

At one point, we had both mall cops and Coralville police present. They assured themselves that we weren't the stampedin' kind and moved along.

The cashiers were great; they were totally behind us. That's the problem with protesting this kind of thing-- the first people to get hurt are the local ones who possibly agree with you.

I will keep my tail because it is my tail. And also because I have curtains, or I will someday.


*Best part: the people who made the tiny placards-- half a page, an eight of a page-- handed them out to tons of people. It counted as a cow accessory and was thus good for delicious free food.