I’ve had a fair amount of gay sex as an adult (I challenge anyone to define ‘fair’), but have never been involved in a fight. This might seem a strange statement to make, but after an experience I had at the weekend, I believe these two forms of physical expression aren’t so far removed.

To say I was involved in a fight would be exaggerating, but the threat of violence was real and so was the adrenaline pumping through my body. It all happened while I was food shopping at my local supermarket. I was a little distracted, ticking items off a mental list and thinking up recipe ideas when a guy, taller and bigger built than myself, came marching at me on my side of the aisle, his basket flailing as he bore down on me. He clearly expected me to somersault backwards into the shelves of vegetables and clear his path. I didn’t move and, in fact, as he knocked past me at speed, clearly unhappy at having to swerve slightly, I might have held my shopping basket out a bit further than necessary, but I’m not admitting to anything.

Just after the point when our baskets clashed and kind of locked, causing this big guy to stumble slightly, that’s when it all kicked off. I quickly realised this was a man who wasn’t going to let it go. He squared right up to me, inches from my face and started to make silly threats and insults in a gruff, slightly raised voiced. His face was bright red and, while he seemed to be putting a lot of effort into keeping his words controlled and even-pitched, his trembling body and clenched fists suggested that he really wanted to pummel me.

In one of those almost out-of-body moments when you seem to be watching yourself react, I responded calmly, but defended myself verbally. My adrenaline was fired to the max. I can’t even remember much of what was said. I do remember him jabbing me hard in the shoulder, however, and my unthinking response, which was to shove him backwards by pushing his chest – it was a very firm chest; big, hard pecs. Everything seemed to go slow motion after that and I could see that meaty fist of his positioning itself, getting ready to strike, at the same time as a security guard’s voice broke the air and the blur of his uniform appeared in my line of sight. My supermarket nemesis dropped his fist and backed off. For the first time I noticed the impressive bulge in his tracksuit bottoms.

The security guy gave us both a warning and sent us off in separate directions. He stuck to me, limpet like, for the rest of my shop. The adrenaline was still there, but easing off slightly, and I started to appreciate what a close call it had been. I also felt pretty macho – it might have been ugly, but this is how real men settle disputes, isn’t it? Well, truthfully, real men would probably fight with shopping trolleys filled with beer and steaks, not small baskets containing mange tout and porcini mushrooms, and they wouldn’t be squaring up in the organic veg section.

I managed to avoid running into the guy again, but while I was queuing for the checkout, he was waiting at another and I got in a few glances under the still watchful eye of the security guard. In a different light and no longer with a red, angry face, my opponent wasn’t bad looking. In fact, I would say he was kind of hot: tall, muscular and cheek-boned. His sportswear hugged his gym-toned body very nicely. In other circumstances I can easily imagine buying this guy drinks and taking him home to fuck. And afterwards, when all the adrenaline had stopped surging and I was back home, I found the whole experience a bit of a turn on! I mean, I did get to feel the fella up a bit and what other way is there, without having gay sex, to stir up such strong feelings between two men and use up excess hormones?

This experience highlights what a powerful thing testosterone is; all those guys walking around, pumped up and looking for a release. It now makes sense to me that some straight guys fight so they don’t fuck; I just wish it were the other way around.