Michael Toler (@casbahmike) • Collective gay friends app

Michael Toler @casbahmike

Just an average guy working in academia. Kinda shy! Looking for conversation. What are your favorite cities, books, songs, architects, movies?

Shopping for scents in Amman

A lot of us list architecture as an interest on this app, but we don’t share many photographs of architecture. Let’s change that! This is one of my favorite buildings, I.M. Pei’s Museum of Islamic Art in Doha, Qatar. Share one of your favorite buildings!

After trying to “fix myself” throughout high school and college by dating girls, I first kissed a guy in my mid-20s, late at night on the platform of an empty Manhattan subway stop, late at night at the end of our first date. I’d just discovered this album, but as I rode the train home, this version of this song echoed so clearly in my mind as I touched my lips and yearned for more!

Disturb me with all your cares and your worries (Speak to me) and let our words build a shelter from the storm (Let me) and lastly, let me know what I can mend There's more, honestly Than my sweet friend, you can see. Trust is what I'm offering If you trouble me.

“The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg. -Thomas Jefferson on Freedom of Religion, 1782 [Query XVII, ‘Religion’]

Cleaning up the yard for the autumn is dirty business!

Such a beautiful song!

Any rugby fans on this app? This is Antoine DuPont of the French National Team.

My 2021 adaptation of a verse from this 1986 tune: “Well, I dreamed there was an island That rose up from the sea And everybody on the island Was somebody from (social media) And there was a beautiful view But nobody could see 'Cause everybody on the island was posing and posting): Look at me!”

An antique quilt panel with my great grandparents’ initials on the vase.

A MAGNIFICENT tree!

Kresge Auditorium at MIT, Cambridge, MA, USA. Designed by Eero Saarinen

Our yard is now certified!

Subterranean hallway at MIT

Autumn reds. Wellesley, MA, USA

So much to do, so little willingness to do any of it. Feeling lazy.

This is a completely unedited photo. I LOVE this light!

Dilemma of the day: Need to get up but don’t want to disturb the kitties!

My girl on my shoulders!

Dahlias and bees

It finally bloomed, but you’ll need a drone to see it from the top! It’s almost a meter taller than me!

The bees love this dahlia?

An update on the cosmos: The day before yesterday I measured the tallest ones. They were 228 cm high. Today they are at least 30-50 cm taller! They have blossoms, but still haven’t bloomed. You can’t really see the top in this picture, and I circled it. The arrow points to the top of my head!

Feeling a little silly on campus.

Still one of my favorite songs from a musical!

This arrived in July four years ago! A great album!

A scholarly cat!

View across Killian Court from Building 10 on the MIT Campus, Cambridge, MA, USA

Can’t believe how close this handsome fella got to us!

Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA

An intense piece of music!

A hypothetical: You have been condemned to spend 20 years in solitary confinement. All your basic needs will be met, but you will not have any human contact. There is a large television and a DVD player, but you can only have 1 DVD to watch for the next 20 years! What is it?

The cosmos are actually quite a bit taller!