h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Hello everyone!

Hasn't it been a long time since I wrote a Journal Entry? Anyway, I think it's high time I wrote one - and it will be quite long, so please bear with me!

Right, first things first ... my love life. If you haven't read the replies to my last journal entry, you'll be pleased to hear that I've actually found another b/f! His name is Carl, he's 35 years old (not 30 as I originally thought he was, but to most people he does look relatively young) and we met on my 24th birthday back on 8th January this year in a club in Manchester ... and five-and-a-half months later, we're still together and very much in love. He works as a head chef at HMP Manchester (formerly Strangeways Prison) and owns three houses: one in Salford where he lives with his lodger Mike, one in Hulme (which he lets out to students) and one near Bath (which he also lets out). He also has quite a few gay friends, including David (who's also known as Sweetie by Mike) and Jason (who, with David, are known as "Hinge and Brackett" ) - both with b/f's in Rochdale and Newcastle respectively (although it doesn't stop Jason from sleeping around a bit), Gary (an ex-b/f of Mike's, a very good amateur dancer) and various others who occasionally visit Carl's Salford home. As far as his family goes, I've not yet met any of them - in fact, Carl still hasn't come out to his parents, mainly because his younger brother tried to come out to his mother a couple of years ago and got a negative reaction. This has been a bone of contention between Carl and Mike, who also disagree on politics as well - Carl is near-enough a true-blue Tory boy, while Mike is a strong Labour supporter. (I also have different views to Carl, but I quite enjoy discussing them with him, which gives us something to talk about at least when we're not watching TV or other things ...) But aside from that, they do actually get on quite well and I've been getting on exceptionally well with Mike too - he's just as big a classical music fan as I am, if not more so (if that is even possible!).

Anyway, in the last five months or so, I've been over to Carl's house fairly frequently: about once a week or so, although I have stayed over for more than one night in a row from time to time. He's also been to see me play my viola in various things (although he's not really a classical music fan): the Gilbert and Sullivan Society's production of Ruddigore (when I was deputising for one of the violists in the orchestra) and the concert for the university orchestra I play in. Actually, Mike also came along to the orchestra concert and I'd also persuaded Stephen, a gay friend of mine who has also been studying in my department, to come along as well. During the interval, I introduced both Carl and Mike to Stephen and they all seemed to get along rather well - however, it wasn't until the following day when I realised that both Mike and Stephen actually fancied each other!

Stephen had just come out of a relationship and wasn't sure if he could handle another one, but one of his friends persuaded him otherwise - so two weeks later, I handed Mike a card that Stephen had written and included his phone number: within five minutes, Mike was on the phone to Stephen; an hour and a half later they met at a bar on Canal Street (while Carl and I had a "quiet" evening in); the following morning, after Carl had gone to work very early and I'd got up, I came downstairs to find Mike in his dressing gown, beaming and making two drinks, and a mobile phone and pair of shoes that I knew didn't belong to Mike! Sure enough, they'd got on so well that they also became a couple more or less instantly! (Not bad for a bit of matchmaking, eh?)

Anyway, at the end of May during the Bank Holiday Weekend, Carl and I went down to Bristol for a relaxing couple of days together. We stayed at Paul and Carl's (a gay couple that Carl knows), who looked after us and took us onto the gay scene on Saturday and Sunday nights. Saturday night was relatively quiet, but Sunday night was interesting ... we ended up at Queenshilling, where a group of guys who'd attended the Pride Ball turned up in their dinner suits and started drinking champagne. An older looking guy became just a bit interested in Carl, while a younger guy (who did look good with his shirt off, I have to admit ) took quite a strong interest in me: he asked how long I'd been with Carl and advised me not to cheat on him, although "threesomes would be fine!" I naturally said no, but that appeared to make him more determined - he later asked if he could do something to me in the toilets, which I said "wouldn't be on" and he said "it would be on". While I had gone to the toilet (alone, thank goodness), he told his friends (in earshot of Paul and Carl) that he really wanted to have sex with me and also mouthed it to me later on that night. Fortunately, he never managed to trap me in those toilets and when Carl and I, Paul and Carl went home, this guy was wandering about outside the club looking rather disappointed.

The following day - after a long lie-in - we were driven to Carl's house near Bath, which was the start of a kind of complicated spying mission ... Carl not being out meant that we had to be careful both in his house (as the lodger living there didn't know either of us was gay) and outside it (as his parents had a second home four doors along the road). However, it didn't stop us having a romantic walk in the hills - where we got a phone call from Mike saying the Salford house had been the scene of a crime (likely to have been a young lad Hinge and Brackett had brought back and had fled after something) or having a drink in town at two bars: DYMK (Does Your Mother Know? - very appropriate! ) and the Bath Tap. Carl decided that we should walk back to his house along the River Avon and then up the hill, i.e. by a scenic route. However, as we got down a flight of steps near to a bridge, a girl rushed up past us and two down-and-out type men cornered us and demanded money for "sleeping with their girlfriend" - unfortunately, one of the men started head-butting and punching Carl ... I tried to step inbetween them, but I was mostly pushed aside apart from being punched in the face at one point. Eventually, Carl gave them £30 and they ran off, saying "you've been robbed!" as they left and leaving Carl covered in blood. We managed to attract the attention of a group of young people who'd just finished a boat trip and they took us along to the police station, where we cleaned ourselves up, had statements taken etc. before Carl was taken to the hospital to check on his injuries - a broken nose and a black eye (mine were practically non-existent) and then home at about 6am. The following morning, after the valuers had been around Carl's Bath house, we went into town again, partly for a wander around and partly to go back to the police station so Carl's injuries could be photographed. I had to go back home that afternoon (for reasons of work etc.) so I got on a train at Bath Spa station, and while we didn't kiss on the platform, we were blowing kisses to each other through the window - the experience has brought us even closer together.

On my way back, I phoned Mike and told him what had happened - he was obviously shocked (as was Stephen, who he told pretty much straight away and phoned me shortly afterwards) and insisted I come back to Manchester after they had gone to see the latest Star Wars film at the cinema. I first had to return to Congleton (as I'd set off from there) to pick up the car and I told Amy and Rachel what had happened - they were equally shocked. Just before I set off for Manchester, I got a text from Stephen saying they were not going to the cinema that night and insisting I come round to his house in Chorlton, where I got and from Mike and Stephen and stayed the night on Stephen's sofa (although Mike did pop into the lounge from the bedroom to grab some condoms etc. about 20 minutes after we'd gone to bed! ). That really helped me to feel better about things and by the time Carl returned to Manchester on Friday evening, I was pretty much OK and able to say how much I loved him without bursting into tears. Since then, I've popped around a few times - while Mike was at Stephen's - for more hugs, cuddles, kisses etc.

Apart from my love life, I've also been doing well with my uni work. I finally completed my Management Diploma - I got a barely passable mark for my Management Accounting module but a fantastic one for Marketing, so I ended up with 31 out of 40 points: enough for a Class I diploma! I've also been doing a lot of calculations for my research - which seem to produce meaningful results - although I'm now struggling to get enough for a presentation at the 7th World Congress of Chemical Engineering in Glasgow next month. However, I'm getting there ...

I've also still been playing in the various orchestras - as the story about Mike and Stephen getting together partially shows ... apart from the uni orchestra concert (where we played Tchaikovsky's Romeo and Juliet Fantasy Overture, Richard Strauss' opus 27 songs and Brahms' Fourth Symphony), I've also played at a "family" concert for Oldham Symphony Orchestra and last Saturday, Congleton Youth Orchestra finally had their "Rotary" concert after a two month delay due to problems with the now ex-Wind Tutor. However, the concert was a great success, even if it was so hot in the venue that a veneer of sweat was left on the marble-like floors afterwards! To fill out the programme a little, I did a solo with the leader - a Concerto for violin and viola da gamba by Telemann - which went pretty well.

Anyway, I think that's probably enough for now ... I hope to get the next entry sooner than in five months' time!

Mikeo