The Gay Blade

Why Ban Poppers?  Amyl. Poppers. Rush. Jungle Juice. Leather Cleaner. "Room Deodorizer" (That one always puzzled me in my teens when I'd see that description in gay magazines - why did gay men need to deodorise their rooms so much?). They've been part of gay men's life from before I was around, and I've been around a while. From dance floors to bedrooms, we've had a lot of fun with them, one of the most innocent of all recreational drugs. The rumour is that they used to pump them through the air-con at Alfies in the 80s, but I don't know if that is true. We certainly used to take them out dancing, and of course for sex after dancing. Some dancefloors stank of them. Getting your arm jostled as you had the bottle up to your nostril and getting a dose up your nose was a hazard. I worked on Craccum a bit when I was at University, and I remember another volunteer was a chem student and brought a marmite jar full of his own pure product made in the universit...

So all things being equal, it looks like we're going to get the right to get married , if we're all reading the tea-leaves in the right way. It seems like it's going to get through. Marriage. Love. Intimacy. Trust.   If the point of marriage is a public, legally binding declaration of love in front of all who we love and recorded officially by the power of the State, then is it ok for the married couple to stop using condoms?  After all, if you've decided to make that commitment to another guy and maybe you're going as far as buying a house together, merging your finances, getting a mortgage, sharing a credit-card, all the things you see in so many straight marriages - surely if you're doing all that with each other, you can consider whether you need to still follow the old rule of  "Use a condom every time!" Looking at the NZAF's latest condom campaign , they seem to be saying  "No!"  And it's not just here in N...

Apparently the Buddha once said that if humanity had one more drive as strong as sex there would be no hope for us ever to achieve enlightenment because we'd all be too distracted. Matthew Stradling http://www.matthewstradling.com/ I guess he knew what he was talking about. I know that sometimes I can sink into some sort of erotic fog, where sex is my major preoccupation, my pleasure, my joy, my reason for being. At times I just want to chase and be chased, to hunt, to find, to feel that anticipation of a new lover's arrival. And I actually welcome that, I revel in it, I love the fact that I have great, warm, passionate, loving, tender, kinky, and most of all - fun - sex. And yes, I'm just coming out of one of those times again now. Sometimes that urge just gets so strong, and when it all comes together, well, it's fantastic. Whether it's with a man I have known and cared for over years or some random off the net I'll never hook up with again, ther...