Wardrobe malfunction

I keep seeing this poster all over London and it has been bothering me. Am I imagining it, or does it look like Gisele is, er, "pleased to see us"?

Another gem from Mr. Lagerfeld:

About Pete Doherty: "His music - the look - is over now. There is nothing to think about. It is too late."

Utter dismissiveness. God, he's fabulous.

This evening I had a conference call with a client in Atlanta. The call was at 8pm, so at 6pm I decided to grab a newspaper and go to a nearby restaurant to have supper, before I came back to work for the call.

I sat in a quiet corner of the restaurant and just above and infront of me was a small television which was showing BBC News 24. At one point my attention strayed from the Evening Standard that I was reading to a news report about John Hogan, the man who recently jumped from a hotel balcony with his two children, an action which resulted in the death of his six year-old son.

The news report featured extended clips of this both literally and metaphorically broken man, crying uncontrollably as he was charged with the murder of his son and with his own attempted suicide.

During the report the waitress came over to take my order. She saw that I was looking at the TV and looked up to the screen herself. "Such a tragedy," she said. "How could he do it?"

I've heard a lot of people say similar things about this man over the past few weeks and while I can see why it is only natural that they should ask that question (after all, how many people, with complete sobriety, jump off a fifth floor hotel balcony with a child under each arm) I can't help but feel some kind of empathy for him and affinity for where he must be right now.

It was dazzlingly apparent to me, watching the news report, that John Hogan is a man deeply and desperately in remorse for what he has done to his son, his daughter (who survived with only a broken arm), his wife and the rest of his family, not to mention himself. Infact all of the objective news reports seem to all agree that John Hogan was a loving father and that what he did was completely out of character. While my circumstances are entirely different from his, I know what it is to wake up in an intensive care unit to be told that you have tried and failed to take your own life and as a result have your world completely fall apart.

I don't, and most likely will never know, what it is like to lose a child, let alone at my own hands. But I do know what it is like to experience something akin to insanity, regardless of what caused it. Each of us are passionate and often irrational creatures capable of wild and spontaneous actions that can last mere seconds, but have consequences that change everything and last a lifetime.

While I believe that anyone who breaks the law, in what ever way they have broken the law, should be prosecuted, I also believe that there always needs to be some kind of "human" factor to take into account what that person is going through in terms of remorse for their actions. I know that this does happen in some cases, but I don't think that it happens in all.

I hope that whoever decides upon John Hogan's ultimate sentence takes into consideration the massive apparent remorse he seems to be experiencing. This is a man who no doubt will suffer as a result of what he has done for the rest of his life.

But more than that I wish there was a way that I could tell John Hogan that not everyone is asking "why" and that not everyone despises him for what he has done.

Harry

Say, "Hello Harry!"

Joy

It's like all my Christmases and birthdays have come all at once!!!

Ruined

Just over a week ago the owners of my company took all 150 of us to Oxford for a couple of days. During that time we generally indulged ourselves in much surreptitious, drunken, bawdy behavior.

A great time was had by all, especially at the mock-Woodstock type festival that was set up, with real stage and real bands, all in one of the gardens of one of the college houses. It was a fairly noisy affair.

A tad too noisy, perhaps.

Crack

I have succumbed and joined the MySpace revolution.

Can I just point out that I have been rabidly against doing this, because:

a) I didn't want yet another thing to distract me away from my work duties

b) when people talked about their MySpace profiles I wanted to be able to gloat that I didn't have one. You know, because I'm so fucking cool.

However, the reason I succumbed is because I am doing a project for work which requires me to join MySpace. Very irritating.

Despite that, please feel free to add me as a friend. Please! Because, um, I don't have very many at the moment ...

On Monday night I went to dinner with my ex-boyfriend, Will, and his new boyfriend, Jason, who were stopping off in London on a trip. The last time I saw Will was over two years ago, just before I left New York to come back to the UK.

Despite some obvious worries about seeing him, we had a really great evening. I met them at their friend's apartment in Baker Street, we went for a drink, my friend Sam (who had met Will before in NYC) met us, we went to dinner and then we went to the Shadow Lounge. Will was as I remember him: still cute, still funny, great company but I was relieved to find that my heart wasn't doing somersaults all over the place, the way it used to when we were dating.

Jason was also really great and I didn't feel in any way threatened by him. He's just a really nice, funny, interesting, really cute guy, but we're obviously very different people. He and Will made a great couple and I felt comfortable in their company.

It wasn't until I'd said goodbye and I got in a cab to come home that I began to feel absolutely dreadful.

I'd been worried about seeing Will, only because I thought that there was a chance that I would fall in love with him all over again. That didn't happen. I think I'd be lying if I said that I don't feel anything for him anymore, but I think the feelings I have are really just feelings of fondness. I felt myself kind of just wanting to hug him and muss up his hair, as opposed to wanting to make out with him, if that makes any sense?

Having now had a few days to think about it, I realise now that what spun me out was seeing my ex-boyfriend with his new boyfriend, seeing them so happy, seeing them play it out with each other. The way that Will would squeeze Jason's shoulder, touch his face, smile at him ... made me think back to the time when he would do the same things to me. And it wasn't that I wanted him to do them to me again, instead of Jason. I didn't even feel jealousy. They just served to remind me of something that I had kind of tried to put to the back of my mind.

I really want a boyfriend. And not (as I said to my friend Bill, yesterday) in the manner of (say it like a teenager), "I want a boyfriend!"

I want a partner. I want someone to share my life with. I've gotten past the point in my life where I just want to hook up with hot guys (note the operative word: "just"). I want someone to make me compromise my selfishness. I want someone to come home to when I finish work.

And while he might be lovely, Jamie, my straight house mate, doesn't really count.

God is in my iPod

This morning I felt a bit, but not a whole lot, better.

In my continuing funk, when I got to the gym, I couldn't decide what music I wanted to listen to. So I let my iPod do all the work by putting it on shuffle.

Kitty Empire, the music editor for The Observer, once wrote that she thought that God was the shuffle facility on her iPod. I think I agree, because the very first song to play was this.

Ok, it's maybe a tad fromage-tastic, but somehow apropos and the lyrics really did make me feel sooooo much better.

Ah, iPods.

Is there anything that they can't do?

I'm still here.

Lots of things have happened in the past two weeks that I can't even begin to tackle in a single post. I guess I'll have to make a concerted effort to write about them individually over the next few days.

I've written a lot about how over the past two years I've come a long way from where I used to be. But every now and then I have a day where I feel that a touch of that blackness that I used to feel so frequently. Yet however bleak things might seem in a single day, somehow I'm now always able to pull myself back up and soldier on.

I'm feeling that bleak darkness now, but I'm telling myself that tomorrow I'll wake up and I'll feel better. Even if it's only slightly better, it'll still be better and a long, long way from where I used to be.

I have such a charmed life with so many wonderful friends who add so much colour and fullness to everything.

I don't know where I'm going with this.

I'm feeling sad. But at the same time I can't help but feel incredibly lucky to be here.

Ever questioned a gay mans credentials for dictating women's fashion? Well then, read this.

And who'd have thunk that Karl Lagerfeld would become my new hero? I must use the line "But I don't think you are well informed enough to make a discussion with me about this," ASAP!

Ibiza

I love this! That comment pretty much epitomises the slightly obscure views that many of the elders at home have.

When you put that next to this, you'll start to understand why I tell people that I come from Bath (which is, incidentally, only 10 miles away and the nearest city.)

"Don't be ashamed of your roots," someone who didn't come from Trowbridge once said.

Chevy Chase

On Friday Helen emailed myself and a few other people with a question.

She has been researching schools for work and the results included a school in America called Chevy Chase. The name sounded familiar to her, so she plonked it into Wikipedia and it came up with him.

Her question had been: why had a high-school named itself after a comedian who had performed so unspectacularly in his own education?

This prompted a few of us to do our own Chevy Chase search and there are, in fact, a few things, people and places named Chevy Chase. One might assume that it was one of them that provided the inspiration behind the naming of afore mentioned internationally famous comic genius.

Helen's brother presented us with this place. It occurred to me, from the banality of the website (and my overactive, salacious imagination), that behind the normalcy of the white picket fences, ornamental street lights and flag-flying would be a veritable hotbed of incest, bisexual partner swapping and a touch of slavery.

But then I realised that the same could be said by someone visiting the website of my own home town.

An open letter to straight men

Hello straight men! How are you? Me? Oh, I'm good, thanks for asking.

Hey, so I know that our conversations are usually fairly awkward, with you saying things like, "You probably aren't interested in football are you, mate?" and "That's so gay! Er, I don't mean it like that. I know loads of gayers," with me then responding with a much-practiced faux laugh and grin which hides a lifetime of pained despair ... but listen up, because I actually have some advice that may help the World become a more beautiful place help you pull birds more.

Now, I did make my thoughts on this subject quite clear some time ago, but just to refresh your memory ... three-quarter length trousers (also known as Capri pants) - so not a good look. No. Not even when you accessorise them with cheapo camouflage flip-flops from H&M, a too-tight beige T-shirt with "Sit on my face" written over your moobs and a lukewarm can of Holston Pils, deftly wedged in between your pudgy fingers and thumb.

Now come on. Don't be like that. It's not just because your loosely toned legs have the complexion of downy-haired chalk ...

Er. Ok. It is because of that. I'm not saying that us gay men are any better, because we have also been known to wear them as well (well, not me, or at least not for a very long time). But when we do at least we've recently gone to the effort of visiting a tanning salon or even Selfridges beauty hall to buy a bottle of St. Tropez.

So, I'll cut you a deal. If you promise to stop inflicting us all to the sight of your pasty, hairy pins in those bloody horrible, nasty trou-shorts then I promise that I'll never, ever tell anyone that when you were 14 you licked it. You know, just to see what it tasted like.

Lots of (platonic) love,

Christopher
x

On Friday I was in the UK's biggest selling national newspaper. Not on page 3, as some of my friends have wittily retorted, but on page 5 of the motoring section.

The reason why was because the bike editor had reviewed the motorcycle course I took last month and wanted to use a picture of someone who had passed. So there at the foot of the page was yours truly, smiling handsomely in his motorbike kit, crouched next to a real-life motorbike. All very marvelous, except for the caption, which read:

"My fellow student: Chris [surname]"

It was like God had been reading my blog this week and decided to publicly defecate on my head.

But the really weird thing was that on the way home from work I stopped by a newsagent to buy my own copy of the newspaper and my name had changed to "Christopher".

Now I know that most newspapers (including the one I was in on Friday) have several print runs and that sometimes the front-page splash might change depending on a breaking story, but really ... is the correct form of my name so important to actually "stop the press" over?

Well yes, actually. It bloody well is.

Postmodern homo-ness

I love this SO MUCH and I don't really know why:

Aftermath

Five people have responded exclaiming that they, also, don't like the shortened versions of their names, but thus far have felt that they could not speak up in opposition of their use.

One department head thinks that I am hilarious and have a clever way with words.

*stony face*

I am and I do.

My immediate board director thinks that I should be called whatever he sees fit to call me, which is currently CK (my surname begins with a K.) For obvious sartorial and super-hero alias reasons, I can live with this.

It has also created something of an existential debate: can one influence or complain over the choice of his or her nickname? My opinion is no, but a shortened version of one's name is technically not a nickname.

It's a minefield! It really is.

What is now an open letter

I just sent this email to my entire company and now I'm starting to have pangs of regret:

Dear All,

(I'm opening myself up to a barrage of emails here, but anyway ...)

When I joined the company there was one thing I didn't list as a "dislike" and that is people calling me "Chris". However, the trend for calling me just that is, to my disturbance, growing. I'm making no judgements on any of the culprits, because that would alienate most of the people I work closely with (some of whom are in charge of my salary and my having a job here!)

But until somebody comes up with a name for me which I deem to be even better than my actual moniker (e.g. Brutallyhottopher) it'd be much appreciated if you could just call me Christopher.

You can, of course, call me anything you like behind my back (and you probably will after having read this email.)

I love you all!

Christopher

"How big are you? I mean, how tall are you?"

More about Thursday night's date tomorrow. In the meantime I'd like to introduce you to my new crush: Brandon Routh / Clark Kent / Kal-El / Superman / whatever:


I've read reviews which have commented on how good the film is, if only half an hour too long. The first part of the that I agree with, but the latter ... ridiculous. I mean, look at the man! Only the most red-blooded heterosexual male could be irritated at having to endure literally hours and hours and hours of staring at his near-perfect form. In my opinion the movie was not long enough, by far.

Kate Bosworth, on the other hand, was shite. Bring back Margot Kidder, even if she is 57 years old.

This morning I went to the gym and for the first time had a conversation with the brutally hot guy who has been cruising me for the past few months. A conversation that resolved itself by him agreeing to go for a drink with me on Thursday night.

"Would you like to go for a drink with me?"

"Yes."

It's a simple dialogue and who knows? Maybe it will set me on the path to this:


But then again, it may set me on the path to this:


(I Googled "anguish" and it came up with that picture. As any gay boy knows, the only way to properly experience anguish is to buff-up and wear tighty-whities with legs akimbo.)