Interesting Christmas Presents

1) A pile of original 78s. (Mum & Dad)
My parents abandoned their normal sweetly absurb attempts (last year's top horror: a double-breasted leather jacket that would have looked baggy on the cast of Fat Friends), and instead provided me with a cloth album of old, terribly cherished shellac 78s.
They've been played to death, and only work on my modern turntable with a bit of enthusiastic hand-cranking (wistful sigh). But are just maginificently odd.

2) Dr Who Theme Present (Lee)
Dear Lee got me the following as a tribute to the Dr Who story "Remembrance of the Daleks":
- Sugar
- A Skipping Rope
- A Time Controller

3) Bag o Shite (My Flatmate)
Obviously, my flatmate wants to move out as soon as possible. Why else would she have brought lactose-intolerant me
- Vodka cream liquer from the Shetland Islands
- Two jars of out-of-date cooking sauce?

Old Shags Revisited

Bumped into the first guy I shagged after I moved to London last night.

It was in the summer of 2000, and there he was standing on the Tube platform. We glared at each other all the way back to Camden Town, where he took me back to his council flat, cooked me chicken nuggets, and then let me do fantastic things to him on the balcony.

But there I was, staggering around the Black Cap after seeing Eddie Izzard, and there he was, leaning against the bar - still typical Rough-U-Like, all muscles and bad hair.

I wandered over.

ME: "Hello - you're the first person I shagged when I moved to London."
HIM: "Oh. Yeah. Want to do it again?"

So we did. He still lives in the same Council Flat, with a carefully ironed duvet cover and fifteen books (Andy McNabb, James Herbert, and The Borrowers).

I staggered out at three in the morning, and there were people dealing crack in the stair well.

Season of "oh why bother"

Trying to write a news story without using the phrase "something new for you to hate, you joyless fucks"

Cocktails

Just enjoyed a strangely lovely cocktail party. At our desks. We nipped out, spent £20 on booze, ice, and cheese and pineapples, and then sent out the invites.

Within about fifteen minutes, our corner was stuffed full of people discovering that a vodka martini (with an olive) was the nicest imaginable drink.

Within another five minutes we had carols on the stereo, cookies, and the head of department.

Now, two hours later, i'm slumped over my desk, typing this up, rather than daring to either...
a) vomit
b) tidy up

I have a dinner party to go to. I have no idea how i'll even find my bike. Let alone ride it through Notting Hill.

If I leave now I may just be able to walk it there in time... :)

New insult

That picture makes you look like a kids' TV presenter... on one of the digital channels.

Scherzo

Lee wrote this. It will only really appeal to Dr Who fans who've listened to Scherzo - a play about two people walking hand in hand through a white void. But I've preserved it for posterity anyhoo

(fade up)

James: It’s so bright! I can’t see!
Lee: (as catchphrase) My eyes! Oh, my beautiful eyes!
James: The light!

(a beat)

James (cont) Oh. Still. It may give me a nice tan, though. Shall we walk?
Lee: Do we have to?
James: Yes. There may be something exciting.
Lee: Mfft. I doubt that.

(time passes)

Lee: How long do you think we’ve been walking?
James: A month? A year, maybe.
Lee: Its ten minutes. I counted.
James: Oh well. We can sing if you want.
Lee: (distracted) Honestly, I can’t see my hand in front of me. But! If I grope this way I think I’ve found a big slab of meat…
James (under breath): It’s just like Sailors for you, isn’t it?
Lee: What?
James: Nothing.

(time passes)

Lee (panicked): James! James! I can’t feel your hand!
James (far off, muffled): I’m over here!
Lee: Where? Where are you?
James (suddenly close. SFX: zip being done up): Here I am.
Lee: Oh! Right. I think there’s something in here with us!
James (looks back at faint bushes): You may be right.
Lee: I think it’s evolving.
James: You could say that. Last time it was Latvian. Now I think it’s Brazillian.
Lee: What are you on about?
James: Er.
Lee: Anyway. Hold my hand. I don’t want to get lost.
James: Alright.

(SFX: squelch.)

Lee: Eww.

(time passes)

(SFX: chatter, humming of ‘Can’t Get You Out Of My Head’)
Lee: I think it’s trying to communicate!
James: Yes! I made out ‘phone number’ and ‘want to make fuck with you’!
Lee: Do you think it wants to eat us? Or something?
James: I think it just wants to get down our throats!
Lee: Hmm.

(time passes)

Lee: I really wish you’d washed your bushwanked hand before you stuck it in mine. Now I can’t let go.
James (jovial): Well! It is a jolly adventure, isn’t it?
Lee: No.
James: Well, if I give it a swift tug, it may come off.
Lee: That’s what got us into the trouble in the first place.
James: What?
Lee: Nothing.

(time passes)

James: (snatch) That’s MY broach!
Lee: I think you’ll find it’s BBC property. Look. See?
James: Oh.
Lee: Yes. That means it’s going to get taken off you at any minute.
James: I hate you, you know.

(time passes)

JAMES: This wouldn't be so bad, but we ran out of vodka at the end of CD One.
LEE: No wonder I ended up with my mouth pressed to yours. I was trying to get the last fumes out of you by squeezing.

(they press their mouths together. awkwardly)

LEE: I thought we agreed, no tongues.
JAMES: Oh, sorry.

(they walk on for a bit)

JAMES: I love you.
LEE: Sorry - didn't quite catch that - too much background, uh, noise.
JAMES: I said, I Love You.
LEE: Hmmn. No. Not quite getting through. Sorry.

JAMES: I LOVE YOU! (sudden, alarming echo)
LEE: (quietly) And I love you too, dear. Got any more Jaffa Cakes?

JAMES: But - after all our adventures together - when you had to choose between saving my life and those q-jump tickets for GAY - I understood - and I thought...
LEE: You. Betrayed. Me. You told me those tickets were for Girls Aloud, but it was only One True Voice.

JAMES: But (plaintive squeak) love, real love - it's like a jigsaw. It's about concentrating on the big picture -
LEE: - And ignoring the big lines on your face. Hmmn.

JAMES: (sulking) I wish you'd cut your nails before we started out.
LEE: I wish you'd stop bleeding over my shoes.

JAMES: (plaintive) I still love you, you know.
LEE: (pointedly) I miss Jeff.

(time passes)

(SFX: wind, chaos)
Scherzo the Brazilian (shouting): Give him to me! You must give me your hand!
Lee: Why? No. You’re only after him for a green card!
James: I’ll do it.
Lee: You will not take him! He’s not that desperate!
James: I said I’d do it.
Lee (surprised): Oh. Alright then.
James: I’ll get bored in a week anyway.
Scherzo: Nooooo!
(SFX of exploding villain)

(time passes)

James: Well, that was fun!
Lee: Mfft.
James: Lets go back to mine and watch a film.
Lee: With popcorn?
James: Oh yes.
Lee: Good.

(a beat)

James: I wonder if I got a tan. Do I look like I got a tan to you?
Lee: No.
James: Oh. Anyway. Shall we?
Lee: Yes. Lets.
(SFX: squelch)
Lee: Eww.

The end.

Whose idea was it...?

To have our office Chrimbo party a two minute stroll from the Hyde Park Rose Garden?

Brought a whole new meaning to the phase "just nipping out for fags".

I wish it could be Christmas every day...

In our canteen.

It can't manage Lasagne, pasta bake, or even chips...

But it can turn out a perfectly lovely Turkey Roast with Pigs in Blankets and all the trimmings.
Go fig.

Cottaging vs Bog Shags

Dear Lee has recently accused me of having sex in toilets.

Well, this is true, but dear Lee does it in a way that, surely accidentally, allows readers to infer that i go cottaging - ie hanging around public toilets in the hope of receiving random jollies.

This is not true, and I'm now going to elaborate on the difference between Cottaging and Bog Shags.

Cottaging is seedy. Gents' public loos - they're not pleasant places. If you're lucky they smell of clean hospital. If you're unlucky they smell like a kidney infection, and look like a sewer.

Public toilets are not nice places to hang around. They're cold, usually outdoors, and... oh yes... have you ever seen the kind of man who goes to one to have sex?

I've found myself in a cottage three times. The first time was at the age of thirteen, when, naively, I went to a gents in a small public town, and was rather puzzled to find myself sharing a trough with two old men who were helping each other wee.

The second time was when I nipped into a Gents in SoHo just after I'd moved to London, and found my flow interrupted by a sharp pinch on my arse from ... well... Jabba the Hutt in a mac.

My third experience was an odd one. After a long evening being entertained by an adorable and sophisticated Italian in Hoxton, we both collapsed, sweaty and exhausted on his bed.

"Do you want to go out somewhere?" he asked, his dark eyebrows beetling across his... (ok, i'm stopping this now: look, he was v. pretty).

I was dead impressed. Here was a man who after a frankly experimental evening-in was planning on taking me out... at three a.m! I was struck by the fact that Italians were not only pretty, but also dead cultured and also knew exciting bars that were open sensible hours.

I followed him out into the street, and then watched as he ducked down some stairs into what was no doubt one of London's Most Secret Watering Holes.

Imagine my horror when I instead found myself in a dark, smelly pit, with no lighting, and vague shuffling shapes in anoraks. My chic friend had taken me cottaging. I was surrounded by creatures of the night - randy Zombies from Debenhams.

I ran home....

****

Now, let's talk about the far more pleasant subject of Bog Shags. A bog shag happens when, overwhelmed by lust-of-the-moment, you end up dragging a boy into the nearest palais du shag - frequently, the loos in a club.

It just seems the right thing to do. Its somewhere convenient to nip off to. Not my ultimate destination on a night out.

I'd argue that sex on trains counts as a bog shag. After all - we'd do it in a carriage if we had one to ourselves (and, once on the Jubilee line at 5am, we did).

And no - it's not unusual. I've done a gentle straw poll, and I'm not the only person (gay or straight) to have grabbed a Bog Shag in a nightlclub.

After all - you can't have sex on the dancefloor.

Well, okay. I did once.

Hum. Gay Dating on TV

There are many reasons why I hate my friend Lee. I could list them. But the internet isn't that large.

Let's just settle on the fact that two people I know have now seen my spot on the "Date Me I'm A Lonely Gay" Channel.

About a year ago I turned up to meet Lee, the be-wigged Jeff, and Lee's fab mother at London's the Yard. I was late, they were all giggly, and there was a camera crew there.

"Have you spoken to the TV people yet?" asked Lee.
"We all have," said his mother.
There was general nodding and encouragement, so I wandered over into a quiet corner and allowed people from the cheap end of cable TV to point expensive camera equipment at me and shout "Start."

And that was it. That was all they said. No leading questions, prompts or hints. Just an expectation that you'd talk yourself into a vacuum.

Which I duly did, with Lee standing on the sidelines, grinning like he'd swallowed the Cheshire Cat and occasionally prompting. I think I talked bewildered old nonsense about being able to put up shelves, and my inventive shunting of Jo the Architect with a philips screwdriver.

And then, at the end of all this, wandered meekly over to the table, to find everyone beaming broadly.

"Well that was odd. What did you all say when you did it?"

"Us? You don't imagine we'd be foolish enough to do that do you? Hah!"

So there we are - tricked into something silly by Lee. For a change.

(For the record, Lee has promised to get me on Babestation - as one of the bored people pouting on a divan in high heels in the bottom right of the screen. This notion almost makes me forgive him).