Previously, on "GAYS OF OUR LIVES"... Our adonis-like hero Gattino  has had a 5 year passionate romance with a body building Australian doctor called Attila.  Apart from the romance bit.  Having met him when he was still young and handsome, Gattino accepted Attila's hospitality in Australia, but on arrival found himself trapped with an ignorant miserable twat, and confined to sleeping on the floor.  Falling out for a year or two our hero's inherent loveliness allowed him to be forgiving (with the exception of throwing it up in Attila's face at regular intervals - which is nice.) and re-establish friendship of a kind with the inedible hulk.  Attila then decided to move to the UK for a year.  A  month after his arrival he paid a visit to Liverpool, and Gays of Our Lives was born.  That visit was pleasant enough, though by the second and final day the conversation had clearly run out and Attila parted, unsmiling as ever, with a formal handshake. He's a charmer.  Despite this contrast between good and evil, the relationship between our hero and this former fantasy figure (now his former figure is just a fantasy, sad to report) has thawed considerably since then, with Attila responding to terms of affection in kind and to declarations of lust with laughter.  He finally gets it!  But would I?  When Lawrence  recieved Attila's invitation to join him for the weekend exploring the city of Newcastle, our hero's first thought was  "Ooooo...!"  The saga continues...  THE FAG ON THE TYNE We met at Newcastle train station.  He smiled.  He actually smiled!  For the first day at least, which was a novelty.  In fact his whole demeanour in my presence was astonishingly out of character, being chatty and keen and upbeat.  He'd  said on several occassions our "adventure" would be "fun", which struck me as relying a great deal more on hope than experience.  Drugs addle the memory.  Too late.     But straight to business - a place to stay .  I'd suggested a gay guest house, on the basis that they wouldn't be perturbed by the screams and the howling doggy-noises, but Attila had been in the station long enough to discover we could book a hotel room from there.  I let him do all the talking as I browsed through leaflets, so that I could overhear without blushing what kind of room Attila would ask for, and consequently what kind of night I could expect.  After all the boy had been considerably warmer of late, and was no longer nervous or negative whenever I suggested we were going to be playing Doctors and Nurses. He would simply grin or laugh in a non-discouraging way.  Before he spoke the woman behind the desk had clearly made her own mind up, declaring that all the twin rooms in the city were booked up.  She then tried phoning this or that place just in case and coming up with nothing.  I crossed my fingers and prayed silently.  "Well I guess we could get a double.." Attila  suggested, calling me over, and seeking my consent.  "Well, it would be a bit of a sacrifice, but I don't mind..." (Thank you Jesus!)  I wandered away again like an expectant father pacing the corridors, as Attila told the woman a double would do.  She wasn't listening.  She'd try this other place first.  No twin rooms.  Praise the lord!  A double will do.  She'd try this one other place which has a family room (a double bed plus a single one) - they sometimes let them give it to two people.  (Shut up and listen to the man, you bitch!  He said we'll take a double!)  The person on the other end of the phone was clearly reluctant to give it to less than 3 people.  (Thank you, lord!) I bit my bottom lip, stared out of the window and prayed that God would not desert me now.  Finally the hotel relented - and at a reduced price, thanks to this lady's kind persistence.  (You stupid, evil fucking bitch!!  Burn in hell you miserable hag!!!!)  She then suggested with self-congratulatory humour that she should have gotten this large room for the girls who'd been in - they'd be so jealous - "you know how long it takes girls to get ready when they're going out...!"  Like you, dear reader,  we both had to bite our tongues and refrain from telling her to wake up and smell the fruit.....   And so off we set into the mean streets of Newcastle.   As a city it's not a place you have a fixed mental image of .  I knew it had much in common with Liverpool but expected it may be grimmer and greyer.  It was nothing of the kind and is a nice looking place, smaller but also cleaner and neater than home.  The main shopping / pedestrian areas  were massively long rows of grand buildings and fine archticeture, there was very little litter around and a lot more people to set off the old Gaydar than I've ever seen at home  (Of course in Liverpool we're more manly).  Newcastle's main physical attribute is the Bridge over the Tyne but that was covered in scaffolding so it was still impossible to go home with a clear mental image of what the place looks like, but I liked it.  Because it's on the coast and has no major cities or towns around it as rivals, Newcastle leaves you with a vague sense of being in an isolated pocket, cut off from outsiders and their ways.  They've certainly got a sinister secret.  The whole town has sold it's soul to the fiendish cult of Belgian boy detective Tin Tin.  Every male under the age of 35 is obliged by law to have his hair spiked and gelled at the front into a sticky up tuft, and to hang around with a fat red faced companion with a beard and a love of fighting.  In the books this character was called Captain Haddock.  In Newcastle he's called the girlfriend.  (or occassionaly "me muvver").   As we were crossing one of the bridges we were approached by a late middle aged bloke in a leather jacket.  "R yis taurus, lyk?  W're yis fram?"  We were indeed tourists - from Liverpool and Australia.  "Ah, war full o' bloody taurus, lyk, nah, dees days - is gattin' like tha' Lundin.  Y'r canna move fir taurus!"  To save your mental health I'll simply explain that with genuine friendliness he was engaging us, two visitors, in conspiratorial chat about all those visitors.  He told us how he'd just been saying the same to a Canadian girl across the road.  Everyone needs a hobby.  He was telling me, while addressing me at all times as "Scouse", where to take Attila for proper beer (he obviously cottoned on straight away that I was the man), when suddenly he said "ba God, yr eyes r green - yis mus' be Irish!"  I confirmed his assumption while flashing a warning glance to Attila not to mention my colored contact lenses, lest he respond "wah - yir gret suvvern poofta!  Awa' n' shite!"  Or something equally well-deserved.  I told him of Attila's desire to try Newcastle Brown Ale, and while warning us not to go to these posh touristy rich places "ran heer" (around here), told us the various beers he'd tried.  "you've tried them all, haven't you?"  "Nah - well - ar'aven drank 'em awl, lyk!"  "No - but you're doing  your best..."  Attila, feeling the need to be apologetic for me declared "you're SO rude!"  He asked what I did for a living.  Attila claimed I did not very much.  "A don' blame yis - ard do same if'n a cud gerra way wir' it."  Aparrently he could get away with it since he hadn't worked in years, being on disability.  "Was it the drink?" I inquired.  "you're SOOO rude!!"  (Bloody tourist - no sense of humour.)  We finally parted and as this truly nice man set off to accost some other stranger, Aussie and Scouse went looking for the hotel.....   He headed straight for the bigger bed.  "I see you've chosen my bed"  I observed.  Sadly not. We were to rest for the evening before going out into Gay Newcastle.  Before that my best chance of a peek show would be when he had to use the shower. The bathroom was too small to change in so some nudity was guaranteed, surely?  Irregular readers may at this point be wondering what I was expecting from Attila.  He and I would both like to know the answer to that question too.  In the course of many emails I've variously described him as handsome and very goodlooking and a muscle god etc.,  based on my first memories of him.  Given such publicity he can only fail to live up to it.  I've so convinced myself of the myth that I've no idea what I'd make of Attila if I saw him for the first time now.  Certainly I can't deny his facial attractiveness, I'm just not at all sure what accounts for it.  He actually has a small face with an unusual shaped jaw, and small chin.  He's a nice looking bloke but modesty alone prevents me from suggesting that - at my best - I'm much better looking.  And I'm not modest. What turns nice looking into handsome is having a body to go with it!  But here too, something's changed.  I always thought he was a muscle-man/body builder type.  I now know after extensive observation that he seems to have shrunk and would be described in the personal ads as a "swimmer's body"!  Not that I'd be complaining!!  Frankly my dears I wouldn't say no, but he would.  And does.  It's been long established I'm as appealing to him as soap is to a Frenchman.  He is immune to my beauty in a way that makes me doubt his sanity.  I already have enough evidence to doubt his eyesight.  One of his persistent self-delusions is that he is "very fussy" and selective in who he's attracted to/ has sex with.  He then shows me regularly photos of his "partners" and it's getting more and more difficult to be diplomatic.  So I don't bother.  It's not that they're ugly particularly - it's just that they're never particularly anything.  (That's the standard I fail to reach?  Jesus, one of us needs help!)  I've long had a pet theory that in order to feel good about himself he needs to be the goodlooking one, hence my company would never be in his interest.....I do love him dearly, but so does he.  Anyway I've decided this immunity to me added to his lack of taste and his claims to be more and more of a slut  is the key to what I want from Attila.  I want to not be the exception.     So on our night in Newcastle what should I be hoping for?  I'd never get a better chance to throw caution to the wind and try and chat up a stranger, and yet after all these years of implying I was after him, would I be missing out on a unique opportunity??  Was Attila weakening?  Mmm...Before we set off he got to see my fabulous torso before I saw his.  I could tell he was impressed, even though he cunningly refused to show or indicate it in any way, shape or form.     We had a list of gay places culled from the internet but the first we entered wasn't listed at all.  We just followed the fruit train.  "Strings" was a peculiar place.  2 small square rooms (there was apparently an upstairs, but in case that involved paying we didn't check) lit in a bright blue filter, so that unusually for these places you could see everyone clearly.  And they of course could see you.  Especially if you were leaning two feet away from the door, facing out so you could see everyone who entered, and looking for all the world like a couple of prostitutes.   Attila was wearing his muscley-slut vest which showed off his bosoms and I counted the glances he got.  I'm pretty convinced I got more, but since these were mostly lesbians and the infirm we'll call it a draw.   It was still a nice place if only for the novelty of clear vision.  It makes terrible regrets the next morning less likely.  Then we moved on to what was apparently the big gay place in Newcastle - Powerhouse.  And big it was too, judging from the huge crowd lined up outside to get in.  How they all fit into the place was a mystery, especially since there appeared to be a minimum hip requirement on the door for the ladies.  They breed some fat lasses in Newcastle.  Sadly for them local by laws impose a maximum clothing requirement too, insuring they spill out of their bandaging in ways they can't have hoped for.     Once inside Attila did the same - it didn't take long for him to take his vest off and head for the dance floor.  This time around I was determined not to miss the free show and took up a position to get a perfect view of his topless gyrations.  After a few minutes he vanished into the mist.   I later found him again dancing near a mirror.  I'm saying nothing, but he was enjoying the company.  All I was interested in was to see if he was getting off with anyone as my cue whether to bother looking myself.  I mean I wouldn't want to abandon him just because I'm a sexual magnet and he isn't....Eventually I decided I ought to do the obligatory circuit of the place to see if I had other options, but after an uncertain number of alcoholic drinks I was in my usual state and found it's not advisable to climb steps that aren't there.  I landed flat on my face more than once and  decided that God wanted me to return to a place of safety and concentrate all my lovin' on Attila.  Now the nice thing about his compulsion to keep his vest off is that whenever he returned to me, the loud music and need to shout in his ear obliged me to put my hand around his shoulder and anywhere else I could get away with.  I just can't figure out how to get my mouth around someone's nipples in the course of casual chit chat.  Having got my bitch all sexed up we returned in the early hours to the hotel....With me still endlessly implying we were abut to have fun and him laughing in a totally non-committal way.  The truth being I already knew what this meant and had done all along.  The curse again.  I'd so conditioned him into not worrying about me by telling him all my come-ons were a joke, that nothing I could say would ever convince him otherwise.  And maybe he was right.  I certainly don't know how to talk straight.  "How do we decide who has the big bed?" he asked.  And I paused , knowing I should say something clever or flirtatious or sexually enticing.  But my brain wouldn't work and all that came out was "ah - you can have it."   And then the most extraordinary thing.  He emerged from the bathroom with a towel around his waist and got under the bed sheets before removing the towel!  I mean I didn't want him flaunting himself (Actually that's a blatant lie.  Of course I wanted him to flaunt himself.  Are you mad?) but after all his claims to be sexually liberated and to believe he had nothing to fear from me it begs the question what he was afraid I'd do.  Swoon?  Be overcome with uncontrollable passion?  Laugh?... Well yeah, ok - maybe I'd have laughed.  But the truth is he is still totally scared of me viewing him sexually.  I actually make the boy's skin crawl.  Which is ..er..nice. Very few of us Love Gods can manage to have that effect on people, so I feel priviliged and realy rather special.   The next morning he got out of his bed the same way, only this time I got to see his arse and a rear view of his balls and very soon, after breakfast, I had a great rough ride on what is certainly the longest one in the world...... To be continued.....