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.)

Here's two more, entirely unrelated, questions for which I have no answers:

Is it at all possible for sex not to complicate things? And if the answer is yes ... then how?

Today the world's analysts, politicians and general public are questioning the logic behind Kim Jong-il's decision to executively-order his defense task force to undertake one of most provocative military gestures of the past 50 years.

But I have another question:

Why did The Guardian's graphic design department choose to represent human-to-Taepodong-2 missile scale with a figure that looks suspiciously like Michelangelo's David?


Look!


I can only think of two possible reasons:

The figure is not only a scale point, but is also an historic reference in a modern context: David as Korean rocket scientist. Michelangelo's statue (based on the Biblical King David at the moment he decided to do battle with Goliath) eventually came to represent the city of Florence as an independent state threatened by more powerful enemies. In this instance Florence is North Korea. It hardly seems to be an appropriate use of symbolism.

The alternate reason is that David is representing poor little western culture which is about to be nuked by a fucking massive rocket. Also inappropriate, when you consider that the combined military prowess of the US and friends would more than overwhelm North Korea and little Kim Jong-il.

Which reminds me - the answer to the question at the top of this post:

It's because he's short.

Sarah is another account director and sits at the desk next to mine. We just had a fragrance fight. It was PR chemical warfare, with my Abercrombie & Fitch Fierce pitted against her Jo Malone Tuberose.

After we stopped fighting (I won!), her phone rang and she answered with, "Oh, hello! Sorry! I'm a bit out of breath. I've just been having a perfume fight with Christopher."

That has to be the gayest opening gambit relating to me, EVER!

God, I stink and my skin's itching.

Look! Goldfrapp come from Bath! That's so funny because, you know, I also come from Bath!

Huh. Weird!

Yesterday I went to lunch with an old friend from school who is having a few problems with her boss. The problems that she is encountering are not insurmountable objects, which she knows, but they are on top of other, more serious, things going on in her personal life, the main one being that her Dad is receiving chemotherapy treatment for cancer.

Towards the end of lunch we discussed how as we have gotten older our need to discuss our problems and issues with anyone who will listen has lessened. In fact there are lots of things that we don't discuss at all and the ones that we do discuss are usually with the people that we have known for the longest.

It wasn't very long ago that I felt the need to talk about all of my problems, all of the time, to pretty much anyone who would lend an ear. The fact that I don't feel the need to do this anymore is just another example, I think, of how I have grown up in the past two or three years.

When I was younger I lacked experience and I doubted myself and my judgment and I had a total lack of conviction in any decisions that I made. You need other people's opinions to make you feel validated. Similarly, when people had their own problems I was always chomping at the bit to proffer my own point of view and advice, because in a round about kind of way it would make me feel better about the decisions I had made in my own life.

These days the idea of discussing some guy I quite like with a relative stranger is really unappealing. That person doesn't know the person I'm talking about and they more than likely don't know me and all the things I have been through and how those things have gotten me to this point in my life. I don't discuss my sexual exploits with people I work with anymore, not because I'm ashamed of myself or of those things, but because it has become boring to hear girls screech and say things like, "But doesn't it really hurt?" (No. It feels great!)

Don't get me wrong. I love meeting new people and making new friends. But I love the warm blanket feeling I get from thinking about all of the people who have been through everything with me over the past 18 years or so and that I have gotten to the point in my life where when I do need to talk about things, they listen and understand and get me and the situation quick enough for the conversation not to have to drag on over hours and hours of sobbing and nose blowing.

Ok, I didn't die but my Mum's other dog, Poppy, did. Not on the racetrack, but back at home in Wiltshire. She'd had leukemia for a while now, so it wasn't entirely unexpected.

Although how cool would it have been if she had died racing sportsbikes around a racetrack?

I felt a bit sad about it the last couple of days, because those two dogs have been such a huge part of my Mum's house for me. I'm borrowing one of the motorbikes to ride home to Bath this weekend and it's so strange to think that they won't be there. It's going to be really quiet without them.

However, the weird thing with my family and dogs is that almost as soon as one passes on, another comes along by some random coincidence. One of Mum's friends has just found out that she's pregnant, just a few months after getting a dog. She already has two children so has decided that it's going to be too full a house to keep the pooch around so it looks as if Mum's going to have it.

Personally I would have terminated the baby and kept the dog, but that's just me.

I didn't die.