What's In A Handshake?

Here's another comic strip from www.explosm.net:

And here's my version - for gay boys:

With my apologies to the creator of the original comic strip.

Well, maybe not. I quite enjoyed distorting the original.

What I Did On Friday

Friday was a busy day at work. I spent half a day in the office and in the afternoon, took a ferry out to our refinery.

It was about a 15 minute journey by ferry to the island where the refinery is located. It's actually 3 islands linked by road bridges. In English, the two of the islands have the suffix "Big" and "Small" and while the third is simply called Snake Island - don't ask me why. It doesn't look particularly serpentine nor does it by now have any snakes. Houdini construction work is currently underway which will substantially increase the refinery's capacity and I think all the wildlife on Snake Island, if there was any to begin with should have been rounded up and transported or at least I hope that's what they did.

I don't much care for snakes so if they culled all the snakes on Snake Island, I wouldn't have lost any sleep over it. This actually reminds me of something from Jack Dee's stand-up routine a few years ago. He was talking about how a driver had accidentally run over a snake and then rushed it to the nearest vet for treatment. Jack, being Jack, was of the view that after having run over the snake, the driver ought to have reversed to make doubly sure that the snake was dead.

I agree with Jack. He's a very funny man.

Part of my work involves overseeing the the marine operations of the refinery and these have to do with, the berthing and unberthing of the various tankers which call at the refinery, cargo operations and the management of the wharves in general. I spent the afternoon with the various Master Mariners who run the operations and it was all very congenial. This was followed by a tour of the refinery and I was taken to one of the PUs (Production Units - or catalytic crackers) to see how things work. I was given a blue jumpsuit, a hardhat and industrial shoes to wear before being let out onto the PU. I also had to wear a hydrogen sulphide monitor. It's a bit like a radiation badge but this device measures hydrogen sulphide exposure instead. The picture shows one of the PUs in operation at night. The PUs operate 24/7.

When I got back indoors, it was about 5pm and there was an urgent telephone message waiting for me. Apparently the crude traders were having some sort of mini-crisis about a shipment of crude from Japan to Australia and were needing advice about a change of destination and short delivery LOI. So much for being able to get away early. I had to spend about an hour on the phone, hand-holding the traders and contracts advisers before I could get away for the day.

Fortunately for me, I didn't have dinner plans till 8pm so I wasn't late or anything.

All in all, it wasn't a bad day. I've resisted having to have a Blackberry so far but after Friday's little drama (which I suspect will be the first of many to come), I think I might not be able to hold off getting one any more.

Kissing Boxers

I first came across this as a GIF image on someone's MySpace page. I was intrigued and asked him where he got it and he very kindly pointed me in the direction of YouTube.

While searching YouTube, I came across several other nice video clips of boys kissing. If this sort of thing bothers you, please feel free to skip the post.

Kiwi Love

I don't mean to perpetuate any stereotypes - it's all a bit of harmless fun and in any case, I was born in New Zealand although I don't profess to share the same affinity for sheep. Apologies to all my Kiwi friends.

While I'm at it, this could just as easily apply to the Welsh - apologies also to all my Welsh friends in advance. I simply could resist!

Snorkles Will Never Be The Same Again

Rock & Rule

Speaking of "rule", this reminds me of some toilet grafitti which I came across while I was an undergraduate which goes something like,

"Lord Denning Rules!"

To which the response was "The House of Lords Overrules"

which is quite witty but otherwise makes no sense whatsoever to non-lawyers.

Matt & His Big Burger

In this post, beef meets beefy:

This cute guy in the pictures is Matt. You can find our more about him from his MySpace page, where these pictures came from.

He's a really great guy and the only straight guy I'm out to. He's been very accepting of me for who I am and you can't ask for more of that in a friend.

As you can tell from his pictures, Matt is into competitive bodybuilding and all the hard work he's put into it has really paid off. He's a totally amazing guy.

And yes, the burger is quite amazing as well but Matt's the star.

Even Cats Must Obey The Laws Of Physics

Poor kitty, that must have hurt....

Dating From A Straight Boy's Perspective

I found this on a MySpace page but the comic strip originates from www.explosm.net. Check out the archives which hold comic strips all the way back to 2005.

An Unusual Elevation

This post is something of a departure from my recent entries insofar as it doesn't feature any cute boys, neither does it, as the
title of this entry suggest, have nothing to do with cartography or the mechanical devices which transport people and goods up
and down but to do with judicial appointments. 

I've just checked the Judiciary website and as of today and it's not there yet but according to the latest Lincoln's Inn
newsletter, Rimer J (otherwise, the Honourable Sir Colin Percy Faquharson Rimer) has been elevated to the House of Lords and
will now take his place as one of the Lords of Appeal in Ordinary. Sir Colin, like many of the other members of the
Senior Judiciary are camera shy and I've not been able to find any pictures of him. There is however, an entry for him
in Wikipedia.

As I recall, the last time the phenomenon of a High Court judge being elevated directly to the House of Lords occurred
when Sir Richard Wilberforce, Sir Colin's predecessor in the Chancery Division, similarly leap-frogged the Court of
Appeal in 1964 only 3 years after his elevation to the Bench. That it has only happened to the puisne judges sitting in
the Chancery Division must surely be more than a coincidence. However, Lord Wilberforce nevertheless retains the
singular honour of having been elevated to the House of Lords far more quickly than Lord Rimer who has only been
elevated after 13 years on the Bench. 

I strongly suspect that must be an inside story to Sir Colin's elevation which some of our Benchers will know.
Unfortuantely, none of my friends at the Bar practice in the Chancery Division and will probably not know the inside
story. Will see what I can find out and will post this either as a postscript or as a separate entry at a later date.

Dragostea Din Tei

In a previous post, I included a clip of the Syncsta boys camping it up to O-Zone's "Dragostea Din Tei", otherwise known as the "Numa Numa" song.

I first heard it when I went skiing in Andorra a few years ago. It was a sunny afternoon on the slopes of Soldeu about 2 weeks before Easter and as my ex and I were having lunch at an outdoor cafe halfway up the mountain. We were rather puzzled when a group of the waitresses at the cafe got on top of the tables and when the song started playing, started dancing to the music. It was very amusing to watch to say the least. The dancing wasn't great but I couldn't get the song out of my head of days afterwards.

The Syncsta boys aren't the only ones getting into the act as there's quite a few video clips on YouTube showing various groups of people doing their version of it as well.

First up, here's O-Zone's original:

Here's a live version:



Here's the US Navy doing it their way (supposedly some of the crew from the USS Enterprise). Interesting - there only seem to be enlisted men in the clip - no officers to be seen at all. I wonder what their CO would have made of this - have them all keel-hauled perhaps? Then again, it's not surprising given that the average age of a crewman on a USN ship is about 23 and boys just want to have fun!



Even the denizens of Azeroth in the World of Warcraft seem to be dancing to it, except that some of the dance movements suggest that some of the characters are dancing to the Macarena rather than Dragostea Din Tei. Have a look at the clip and decide for yourself:



Here's a group of Japanese lolitas (if that sort of thing does it for you) doing it as part of a medley:



This one's got some cute, shirtless French boys doing it:



Here's how a sock puppet does it - a reincarnation of Shari Lewis' Lambchops perhaps?



Here's the American Idle version:



which is a send-up of this:



Hope you enjoyed them (all). Admittedly some were more amusing than others but that's what you get on YouTube.

Syncsta Boys

I've been a bit late in discovering Syncsta but better late than never.

Who is this Syncsta and what's it when it's at home?

Well, if, you're like me until a few days ago, you've never heard of Syncsta, they are a duo of two teenage boys who started off with a webcam making lip-synching videos for a laugh but soon because very well known all over the internet.

They boys are Chris Green and Jake Walmsley, both of whom live in the village of Spondon in Derby, England. Chris and Jake have their own websites (see here for Chris and here for Jake) and Chris also has a MySpace page. Here's some visual assistance - cute aren't they?




If I had to pick one of them to take with me to a desert island a la Sue Lawley (she doesn't do the BBC Radio 4 programme anymore, sadly enough), I'd pick Chris who is the blond one but it's not because he's blond. Honest, I'm not like that. It's his smile - it makes me weak in the knees. For some reason Jake doesn't do it for me in the same way but I wouldn't kick him out of bed!

All this is, of course, only in my head and even though the boys look very cute together and could easily be imagined as a couple, they truth is (as far as they have asserted) is that they are both straight but have a great time making shirtless video clips and camping it up for the webcam, especially in the Gay Barbie song which is probably the funniest one they've done.

The boys haven't seem to have made anything for quite a few months now and perhaps have moved on from making vidoes but I'm hoping that it's not the last we're going to see of them. They could be the next Ant & Dec or Topping & Butch - who knows?

I've posted two clips (Gay Barbie and Dragostea Din Tei) from YouTube and a link to all their other video clips on YouTube. Hope you like them as much as I do.

A Royal Wank

Here's another video clip from YouTube. This one features Jonathan Rhys Meyers in his role as Henry VIII in "The Tudors". Here he is, having a wank. The difference between how royalty do it and us plebs do it is that the former have someone to hold them cum towel for them. Watch the clip and you'll know what I mean.

Incidentally, Henry Cavill who plays Charles Brandon, one of Henry VIII's bratpack succeeds in making colllar ruffs look sexy.

England's Rugby World Cup Squad

Brian Ashton made his announcement today as to which of the players have made it to the final 30-man squad. I wonder whether the loss to France over the weekend had anything to do with some of them being dropped. In any event, the final 30 are

Forwards
Steve Borthwick (Bath Rugby)
George Chuter (Leicester Tigers)
Martin Corry (Leicester Tigers)
Lawrence Dallaglio (London Wasps)
Nick Easter (NEC Harlequins)
Perry Freshwater (Perpignan)
Ben Kay (Leicester Tigers)
Lee Mears (Bath Rugby)
Lewis Moody (Leicester Tigers)
Tom Rees (London Wasps)
Mark Regan (Bristol Rugby)
Simon Shaw (London Wasps)
Andrew Sheridan (Sale Sharks)
Matt Stevens (Bath Rugby)
Phil Vickery (London Wasps - capt)
Joe Worsley (London Wasps)

Backs (14)
Olly Barkley (Bath Rugby)
Mike Catt (London Irish)
Mark Cueto (Sale Sharks)
Andrew Farrell (Saracens)
Andrew Gomarsall (NEC Harlequins)
Dan Hipkiss (Leicester Tigers)
Josh Lewsey (London Wasps)
Jamie Noon (Newcastle Falcons)
Shaun Perry (Bristol Rugby)
Peter Richards (London Irish)
Jason Robinson (Unattached)
Paul Sackey (London Wasps)
Mathew Tait (Newcastle Falcons)
Jonny Wilkinson (Newcastle Falcons)

Of the players selected, the once I fancy most (in no order of preference) are Jonny Wilkinson, Matthew Tait, Jamie Noon, Mark Cueto and Olly Barkley. Click on the hyperlinked names and you'll see more about who they are. Like most of us, the boys don't photograph very well. In fact, these are some of the worst pictures I've seen of them. I'll see what I can do about finding some more flattering ones of these boys to post for a future blog entry.

In the meantime, for those of you who haven't seen it already, the team kit for RWC 2007 looks like this:

Kit on or kit off, they're a wet dream come true. Perhaps not these two specifically but Mark Cueton, Olly Barkley and Jonny Wilkinson certainly do it for me.

I've Finally Decided

Some of you may know that I've been out car-shopping (again!) this weekend. This time, I bought something, rather I put a downpayment on something, to be delivered to me for the beginning of September.

In the run up to the weekend, I narrowed down the shortlist to the following (in no particular order of preference):

1. Volvo S60
2. Lexus IS250
3. Audi A4 (1.8T S Line)
4. BMW 320i
5. Honda CR-V

I'd previously considered the Chrysler Sebring, the Jaguar X-type and the Chevrolet Epica but these were all ruled out without being test-driven.

I then test-drove all the short-listed cars and narrowed it down to 2 - the Volvo S60 and the Lexus IS250.

I didn't really like the handling of the BMW 320i or the Audi A4 and the lack of features on the 320i for the price I would have to pay for it was also one of its disadvantages. The steering on the A4 was heavier than I liked but apart from that, the car wasn't too bad.

I've always been partial to the S60 and the drive was very pleasant but the interior was rather bare and unremarkable as I'd test-driven the IS250 immediately before that.

In terms of price, the IS250 cost quite a bit more than pocket change compared to the S60 and although price was a factor in my final decision, seeing as I'm planning to pay for it over 3 years, the extra money works out not to be very much if spread out over that time.

I spent this afternoon agonising over which car to buy and in the end, decided on the IS250. The reason why the S60 lost out is because it is a model on its way out, to be replaced by a radically different S60 in 2009. It will probably only get here sometime in 2010 by which time, I'd be thinking about getting a new car and the resale value of an old model would probably plunge seeing as a new model had only just been launched.

Comparing these photographs with the ones of the current S60 model, I think it's obvious why I didn't choose the Volvo. Hopefully Volvo will be able to get their act together for the new S60 and incorporate some of the new ideas into the S60 which will be going into the XC60 which is a sort of SUV but not quite. It incorporates some of the interior design features which are currently seen in the C70 but is likely to have a sliding device to replace the gear knob. How it will work in practice remains to be seen. For more information about the XC60, see here.

There are currently on 2 variants of the IS250 on sale here, both of which are automatic (they have a tiptronic (E-shift) gearbox which allows the driver to shift between automatic and manual gears). The main specs are the same for all the variants but in terms of features, the one I bought falls somewhere in between the IS 250 SE and the IS250 SE-L which are on sale in the UK. It otherwise has a V6 2.5l engine which puts out 205bhp which is considerably better than the 2.0 light-pressure turbo engine of the S60 which puts out 180bhp.

Basically, the car looks like this:

Sporty isn't it? I suspect that the similarity in shape between the IS250 and the 2009 S60 is more than a coincidence.

The colour I picked was "Dark Grey Mica" but it's marketed in the UK as "Cadoxton Slate" but it looks like this:

Top Gear's reviews of the IS250 can be found here. The reviewers seem to have a fixation to compare the IS250 with the BMW 320i. I prefer a quieter drive with minimal engine noise so the IS250 suits me down to the ground. The fact that I don't hear the grunt of the V6 is a good thing although I know that most car enthusiasts will not agree but I don't really care. I also think that the IS250 handles better than the BMW 320i and also the entry-level variant of the IS250 has far more features than the entry-level variant of the BMW 320i. The price difference was not much but apparently the resale value of the BMW 320i is better than the IS250.

Earlier on, I made reference to what I thought would have been the poor resale value of the S60 and it was with an eye on this that I picked the IS250. Bearing this in mind, Lexus has launched a prototype IS-F (for sale in 2009) in the USA which is a 5.0l, V8, beast of a car which has a similar shape to the GS300 but has a quadruple exhaust - very scary indeed. I doubt that the IS-F will be on sale here as there isn't much of a market for that type of car but you never know. The prototype looks like this:

More information about the IS F, together with a gallery of photgraphs and a video clip can be found here.

My new IS250 should be delivered to be for the beginning of next month and I'm definitely look forward to driving it.

Am I Mistaken?

Is this hot guy in the picture below really Hady Mirza, the Singapore Idol for 2006 or is it someone bearing an uncanny resemblance to him?

This is what Hady looks like with all his clothes on:

Is it really him in the first picture? If anyone knows, please leave a comment or email me. I'm dying to find out.

More Amusement From MySpace

Whoever did the dialogue in the speech bubbles for this picture really didn't have a clue. If you're getting something as big as that shoved up your hole, you're not likely to be thinking "bad little piggy". Screams of agony (or ecstasy, if that's your thing) are more likely.

A Common Misconception

Many straight boys think that being gay is liking things (particularly other guy's cocks) shoved up your arse.

That's partly true. I don't particularly like having things (even cocks) put up my arse but I like the thought of a cute boy (or several cute boys) doing it to me and sometimes, I entertain the thought of me doing it to a cute boy but it doesn't happen too often.

I strongly suspect that defining a person's sexuality as "gay" purely by reference to a specific form of sexual pleasure is entirely missing the point, as a recent addition to Sean Cody's website suggests.

This addition goes by the name of "Nicolas" who claims to be straight but loves having a big blue dildo shoved up his arse.

There is nothing conceptually strange about straight boys deriving sexual pleasure from anal penetration. Buggery (which I will use as a shorthand for anal penetration) is sexually neutral. One can be buggered by a penis, as easily as by an inanimate object.

Speaking purely for myself, although I suspect that this is true for most other gay boys, the fact that we like, or accept being penetrated by other (gay) boys is simply because we enjoy the physical and sexual contact with them and not with girls.

I wouldn't want a girl shoving a dildo up my arse. That wouldn't be any different from asking me to do other sexual things with her which I find quite unplatable.

On the other hand, while I don't particularly derive any pleasure from being buggered by another boy - I enjoy the thought of it and enjoy the actually experience, not the penetration as such, but the experience of sharing a sexual experience with another boy.

So if there's any straight boys out there who are reading this, you don't need to doubt your sexuality if you like having things up your arse - so long as you still get a hardon looking a pictures of naked girls doing things with other naked girls, you're definitely straight.

This Is Bryson

I visit Chaos Men once a week to see if there're any new pictures and this week, one of the uploads includes a model who goes by the name of Bryson.

According to the site owner, Bryan (whom I think looks good enough to be a regular model for his own website and it's a shame he doesn't, other than the odd appearance in an "Edge" video), Bryson is 19 and has been "on his own" since 16. As a result, he's had to quit school to work but being the go-getting young man that he is, has managed to do some part-time studying. If you're wondering what Bryan looks like, this is him:

Handsome, yes?

In his commentary on Bryson's photo-shoot, Bryan pointed out that the guys who subscribe to Chaos Men are paying for Bryson's education. It's a good reminder for the rest of us who have the money to pay for porn subscriptions that there are guys out there who really need the cash and who are not merely exhibitionists.

Now if we were all only altruistic enough to pay for Bryson's education without him needing to take off his clothes, the world would be a much better place. Not that I'm suggesting that we should stop subscribing to Chaos Men as I wouldn't want to put Bryan out of business either.

On the one hand I would like to see Bryan make more videos of cute boys but on the other hand, I don't want to be responsible for creating a situation where boys, straight or gay, feel desperate enough to take their clothes off for money to satisfy the needs of an anonymous gay public. While I don't have any porn site subscriptions as such, I am at least guilty of being a member of the gay viewing public who enjoys these pictures/videos.

There are some nude preview pictures of Bryson on the Chaos Men website but I decided not to use any. I have no doubt that the gay boys reading this blog would prefer to see pictures of Bryson naked but in the circumstances, I thought it rather unconscionable.

Life is complicated and often, there aren't any simple answers to problems like these.

Mr World 2007

For all you feminists out there who think that the usual feminist arguments about female beauty pagents apply to male beauty pagents, think again.

Men have far fewer issues, if any at all, being viewed as sex objects. Most, if not all but the shyest of straight men will probably be eager to to be the sex toy of a female he finds desirable and likewise for us gay boys, I daresay that the vast majority of us don't mind being the sex toy of the boy we're attracted to or having another gay boy as a sex toy.

Why do you think gay saunas are an exclusively male phenomenon whereas there are no lesbian saunas?

But enough of this two-bit philosophy - it's my blog and I don't need any justification to post pictures of men whom I find attractive. I know you've been getting impatient so let's get straight to the men of Mr World 2007 - the men whom I thought should have been in the final. In alphabetical order of the countries which they represent:

Mr Bosnia & Hercegovina: Nebojsa Malesevic
Mr Brazil: Lucas Gil
Mr China: Jiang Lejun
Mr Ireland: Simon Hales
Mr Lithuania: Gintaras Kuculis
Mr Mexico: Jorge Aceves
Mr Northern Ireland: Ross Lauder
Mr Russia: Roman Demchenko
Mr Spain: Juan Garcia Postigo
Mr USA: Travis Kraft
Mr Vietnam: Ho Duc Vinh
Mr Wales: Leigh Brookman

I've included Mr China and Mr Vietnam as I think J would find them fanciable. Apart from that the only other representatives from Asia were Mr Singapore, Mr India and Mr Sri Lanka, none of whom I fancied much. It was a shame that there were no representatives from Malaysia, Indonesia or Thailand - the omission of entrants by the latter two not being so surprising at they are predominantly Islamic countries but I was surprised that there was no representative from Thailand.

Many of my choice of finalists look better on screen than in the photographs (which were all taken from the Mr World website - to whom I assume belongs the copyright in these photographs) and my pick of the final 5, in order of preference were

1. Mr Spain - His smile is mesmerising
2. Mr Brazil
3. Mr Mexico
4. Mr Bosnia & Hercegovina
5. Mr Ireland

The judges obviously took a slightly different view but affirmed 2 out of my 5 choices (and at the same time, my taste in handsome boys) to be the final 3 who were:

As you can see from the photograph, the judges picked the handsomest boy of my final selection as Mr World 2007 - Mr Spain - Juan Garcia. Here's all the other pictures I managed to find of him so far.

If you've not already had enough of this handsome young man, here's a video montage of him, taken off YouTube. It looks like extracts from the Mr World finals broadcast.