A woman with short black hair and glasses speaks into a microphone, wearing a white jacket and a blue sticker in the shape of Texas on her left side. She is in front of a wallpapered wall with a floral pattern.

Historic wins, last laughs and other top stories


By Johnny Trlica

COMMENTARY: Life is about taking risks, or so it’s been said. A few years ago, at 58, I left the psychiatric hospital industry to pursue a career in apartment leasing. With varying degrees of success at several properties, I landed at a horrible property with an even worse property management company.
Not wanting to be associated with a slumlord type of environment, I resigned before securing another job, a risky undertaking for anyone much less a person approaching his 62nd birthday.
Fortunately, my friend Daniel Hamilton referred me to Mattress Firm. You know them right? They’re the mattress store with a location on every corner.
I landed a new job and a new career field and was entered into their “Manager in Training†program. It’s a pretty intense set-up with four to five weeks of training that includes hours and hours of virtual online schooling and dozens of more hours of in-store training. Customer service is stressed at every point along the way. At times I questioned my ability to soak it all in.
Finally, after a lot of anxiety, I passed a 100-question, multiple-choice online test and a week later a simulation performed with the district manager. With that, I am now an official commissioned salesman. The folks at Mattress Firm have been just as inviting to me as they are their guests.
The lesson: Don’t be afraid to take risks, no matter what stage in life one may be.
Here’s a bit of what we’ve been reading on the Houston Rainbow Herald Facebook page.

Latina lesbian earns Democratic Party nod for Texas governor

Texas voters made history in the primary runoffs. Lupe Valdez, a former Dallas County Sheriff, defeated Houston business executive Andrew White in the Democratic primary race for Texas governor, reports the Texas Tribune. Valdez garnered 53 percent of the vote.
Valdez becomes the first openly gay nominee of a major political party for governor of any state. She is also the first Latina selected to run for governor of Texas by a major party.
On a related note, Gina Ortiz Jones won the Democratic nomination for the Texas U.S. House Congressional District 23, reports HuffingtonPost.com If she wins the general election in November, the former Air Force intelligence officer will be the first lesbian, first Iraq War veteran and first Filipina-American to represent Texas in Congress.
The district’s current representative is Republican Will Hurd.
District 23 is the ninth largest district in size, stretching from west of San Antonio to just outside El Paso.

Laugh your head off

He who laughs last, laughs best, or so it’s been said. It was only one year ago that Kathy Griffin nearly lost her career over a photo showing her holding the supposed severed head of Donald Trump. Under the photo, Griffin wrote: “I caption this ‘there was blood coming out of his eyes, blood coming out of his…wherever.’†It was a spoof on candidate Trump’s earlier comment about Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly during a Republican presidential debate.
Griffin lost tour dates as venues cancelled, was investigated by intelligence agencies, was called sick and others questioned her mental state.
But now she is back on tour and is bringing her “Laugh Your Head Off†show to Houston’s Jones Hall on August 20, reports CultureMap.com.
“The purpose of this tour is, this is such a unique situation, it’s never happened in the history of the United States. It’s such a crazy period. Our accidental president personally put his thumb on the shoulder of my life, not just my career. To quote Don Jr., ‘We don’t just want to ruin Kathy Griffin’s career, we want to decimate her.’
“Well, I’m not decimated. I think it’s important for me to go town to town and make people laugh with my dick jokes and Kardashian stories. Whether you liked that photo or not, it was completely covered by the First Amendment. This shouldn’t happen to any American citizen. God forbid one of your kids accidentally tweeted that photo. They shouldn’t be under a two-month federal investigation.â€

Holy affirmation

Signs that the Catholic Church is inching into the 21st century continue. Juan Carlos Cruz, a gay man from Chile who was sexually abused by a priest said Pope Francis told him earlier this month that God “loves you,†reports Edge.com.
Cruz and two other victims accused Cardinal Ricardo Ezzati, the archbishop of the Chilean capital of Santiago and his predecessor, Cardinal Francisco Javier Errázuriz, and the Archdiocese of Santiago of covering up the abuse that took place over the span of three decades.
In the conversation with the Pope, Cruz said the Pope told him, “God loves you. The Pope loves you.â€
“He said God loves me for who I am, made me like this,†added Cruz.

Johnny Trlica is the manager of the Houston Rainbow Herald Facebook page, your source for the latest LGBTQ news and information. Contact him at [email protected].

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