Greta Gustava Martela knew her name 15 years before she transitioned. It was the namesake of one of her characters in Icewind Dale, a Dungeons and Dragons-based role-playing game.

Urban cowgirls of all stripes are invited to saddle up and hoe down with Texas Rose, a queer women's, trans-inclusive community for women who love women and who love to Texas Two-Step.

Chanukah, the Festival of Lights, commences on December 6. As always, there will be eight days and nights of candle lighting, gift giving and celebrating. This being the Bay Area, some of the events might have a queer twist or two.

"I'm finally getting out of the 'Race' frenzy," says Ben Putnam, aka BenDeLaCrème, the 34-year-old Seattle-based drag performer who brings his full-length solo act, "Cosmos: Space. Time. Splash of Cran" to Oasis from November 12-14.

Yes, it's a retelling of the classic Jane Austen novel as re-enacted by a cast of guinea pigs in photographic tableaus.

The 13th Step event, described as "a bathhouse night for sober fuckers," celebrates gay male sexuality without drugs, filters, borders, or shame.

This year the Drag King Contest takes place at Oasis, and Frottage promises that a wild and woolly time will be enjoyed by all.

The fact that a butt plug was dislodged from Christeene's crevice and flung into the audience, grazing my jacket's sleeve before finding its way to the floor, tells me that Truck is rolling full-steam ahead towards the finish line in raunchy style.

For local Middle Eastern LGBTQs, finding a space where their own culture and music can be enjoyed was limited to the Bibi dance parties. When that event's organizers left town, Ghazwan Alsharif, a gay war veteran, renamed the event Asheq.

The 58th San Francisco International Film Festival's second week (through May 7 at the Castro, Kabuki Cinemas, Clay, Roxie, Pacific Film Archive) delivers breathtaking original cinema, a great lead-in to the 2015 Fall awards season.

One of the party's more recognizable traits is the long line that pours out the door and onto the sidewalk, but it's not much of a deterrent for those eager to make their way inside for daytime drinks, dancing and fun.

Coolidge is known for dozens of film comedy roles. Off-screen, the actress was incredibly down to earth and inquisitive in our chat, often going off topic to ask about my experience as a stand-up comic.

Given the nightlife talent responsible for Polyglamorous, the new first-Fridays dance night at Oasis, it should be no surprise that it was a hit. Promoter-DJs Mark O'Brien and John Major have their own following.

The man convicted of choking to death another man during a 2011 sexual encounter in San Francisco's Buena Vista Park will remain free after a judge acknowledged that he'd already served more time than he was sentenced to.