I remember starting a call centre job with a load of other phone jockeys and on Day 1, while doing intros, this guy got up and announced to the group that he’s gay – steady, they only wanted your name!

I’ve been in my new job a few weeks now and have yet to drop into conversation the fact that I’m dating a guy – I’ve sidestepped this little revelation by referring to Rich only as “my partner”. Incidentally, when did straight people start using our conversational get-out-clause? Several people at work have been using this non-gender-specific description when talking about their loved ones, which has been a real red herring.

To tell you the truth, I’m quite enjoying the ambiguity I’m giving off – as soon as they know I’m gay it won’t be as much fun. There’s another new guy in the office who started at the same time as me and he’s always fishing, but without him asking directly if I’m gay, it’s all too easy to play this game of cat-and-mouse.

I think it’s best to just let these things come out naturally – we’ve got a work social coming up and a relaxed environment with alcohol is usually a good place to open up to colleagues – often you can learn more about someone you work with in one night at the pub than a whole year, side-by-side in the office.

The funny thing is I heard myself on an answer phone message the other day and I can’t believe how gay I sounded! Hopefully that’s just me being paranoid – I can’t be that obvious, otherwise people at work wouldn’t be in the dark.

On the other hand, this guy I mentioned is a very big, burly, macho-looking, married type. If you met him in a dark alley you’d make a quick retreat and probably would want a refund on that gay travel guide. In some ways he seems a very traditional bloke, but then he’s also got this progressive side to him too – he loves cooking, he watches girly movies and his local pub is very gay-friendly – apparently the ‘new man’ is not dead.

What with me trying to sound a little less gay and this guy working on his feminine side, we’ll hopefully meet somewhere in the middle (and not down a dark alleyway).

If there were no such term as ‘gay’, people would have to work a bit harder when voicing their prejudice or making malicious jokes. How can you use the word for something as an insult if the word doesn’t exist?

‘Gay’ as a description of someone’s sexuality hasn’t been around that long, relatively speaking, anyway. Phrases come and go and words change their meaning, and ‘homosexual’ just isn’t snappy enough to be a serious challenger in our abbreviated, tweeting times.

I was sat listening to two teenage girls on the bus the other day – actually, I was trying NOT to listen to them, but didn’t have much choice… as they swore, giggled, bitched, gossiped about boys and used ‘gay’ in every other sentence as a substitute for ‘uncool’, it made me realise that kids aren’t being homophobic, they’re just evolving the language.

I don’t see how these particular girls could be anti-gay because they talked over their suspicions that one of their male friends might be gay – yes they joked about it, but it was done affectionately and they definitely didn’t see it as a negative thing.

I know there’s a lot of debate at the moment about kids using ‘gay’ as a negative label, but I really think some are missing the point: they’re not using ‘gay’ as a homophobic slur; rather they’ve subverted its meaning.

And why not let them have it? For a word that’s caused so much trouble and played right into the haters’ hands, why are we so precious about it and clinging on so hard? We did, after all, co-opt the word ‘gay’ in the first place.

The way youngsters liberally scatter the word into conversation reminds me of a child that’s just learnt a naughty word and keeps using it to get a reaction and because it’s funny to the child.

And it is a new word to a lot of people, because society at large has only just started talking openly about gays. So you could see it as kids trying it on for size.

It’ll be interesting to see where next for ‘gay’ and if a new word enters the popular consciousness to describe same sex fanciers – suggestions on a postcard please. For now, however, if you’re stuck for a label, just call me ‘Joe’.

Personally, I think they missed a trick here and should have combined their gay positioning system with a car SatNav to give you handy directions and a commanding voice when out for a cruise. Mind you, bound to be lots of dead-ends, just like with SatNav: you turn the corner expecting to see a toned Latino, but get a drag queen in Susan Boyle’s casts-offs instead.

Straight guys must get very jealous of us gays sometimes. Can you imagine what would happen if straight guys had as many fast fuck outlets as we do? If they had saunas just along from their local shops, a cruising ground minutes away and a guaranteed fuck at the gym, supermarket and book store. Nothing would ever get done.

This Grindr thing raises a lot of questions too: what if it falls into the hands of gay bashers? What if you don’t operate a 24/7 sex policy, but forget to log out – will you still get hungry homos knocking at your door? What if you drive through an area with a gay shortage? Will desperate guys start tailing you?

I suspect it will just become a way for gay guys to approach each other in clubs without the sooooo 2009 method of actually having to talk to them. A quick text message pinged across the dancefloor from your iPhone will get an answer straight away without having to face rejection in the flesh. Then again, activating Grindr in a gay club would probably cause some kind of meltdown.

Then again, some of the things certain loose-tongued straight friends get up to must surely put me to shame. Take Linda, for example: she really is Queen of the Butt Plug and has never been interested in giving her arsehole mere supporting status.

Turns out we’re being out-sexed in the suburbs too. Rich and I have kept a fairly low profile within our street since we moved here. It’s probably that thing of pre-empting any homophobia by distancing yourself before they get the chance to reject you. Which is sad, I guess, but such an easy habit to pick up when you grow up gay.

Anyway, we decided to make more of on effort this Christmas. We get the posters through our door from the local residents’ group, including an invite to this year’s (well, last year’s now) Xmas party and so we went along for sugar-dusted mince pies and sugar-dusted questioning…

It was fine; mostly middle-aged couples who were all friendly. One couple seemed particularly friendly: Scottish, early 50′s I’d guess and very attentive with the alcohol. They own the big house on the corner and seemed very interested in us.

We ended up talking most to this couple and the husband became more and more affectionately physical: bear-hugging and thigh slapping etc. in the way that some straight men do once the booze has pounded their inhibitions and self-consciousness.

As the party thinned and the couple drank more, their loud and colourful language, innuendo, rude jokes and general sauciness got some disapproving looks from the straight-laced members of the residents’ association.

We decided it was time to make our excuses and leave, thinking we’d leave the Rude 2 behind, but they wanted to walk with us. It was quite a raucous walk back, but as we neared our own house their conversation suddenly became more serious and little more than a whisper. We were being invited to their New Year’s eve party.

They reassured us that none of that ‘boring, old-fashioned’ crowd would be there, just lots of fun, ‘like-minded’ people and even some ‘nice, young men,’ the woman said, leaning in… oh my god, we’d just been invited to a swingers party!

We both made some fumbling, non-committal response with the intention of saying “thanks, but no thanks” but without sounding rude or judgemental.

We didn’t go, but I would love to have been a fly on the wall. It explains the grotto-type thing they’ve got at the bottom of their garden with fairy lights and what I suspect is a hot-tub. I bet they’re disappointed that they haven’t managed to recruit the local gay couple to their sex parties – maybe gays are the latest must have for married swingers’ parties.

Needless to say we’ll be keeping ourselves to ourselves again when it comes to the neighbours.

I went along to give support to one of my best friends who was in a panic about his previous night’s gay fuck. He slept with a guy he’d met earlier that same night at a Christmas party. The booze flowed, they hit it off, danced ’til they dropped, back to his, and ‘forgot’ the condom.

My friend is usually so militant about safe sex, always prepared and in control. For some reason he didn’t stick to his own high standards that night – I think there was so much chemistry between him and this guy – an attraction he’s never felt – and it caught him off guard.

Cue frantic phone call to me early the next morning after he’d slunk out of this guy’s house. He needed to get tested A.S.A.P. and didn’t want to be worrying about it all over Christmas and the New Year. Would I go along with him for moral support?

Sexual health clinic waiting rooms can never be pleasant places to sit even if they had made the effort to put up some rather sad looking Christmas decorations. It was incredibly busy – the party season obviously being a busy time for STIs – and we were informed matter-of-factly by the person at the desk that a long wait lay ahead.

I’m sure making you wait hours in a drab and uncomfortable room is all part of the plan, giving you time to think about those errors of judgement when it comes to gay sex. My friend was certainly glad to have someone there, and to play the game, ‘what do you think they’ve come in about?’

In fact, people-watching is one of the few things you can do to pass the time, what with the magazines being at least five years out of date. There’s the mincy homo who strides in like he owns the place – obviously clocking up some mileage. There’s the twitchy first-timers, all on their own, reading a mag upside down and nervously looking up anytime someone walks through, as if a gun-shot’s just sounded.

You’ve got your couples; your young mums with babies; your older gay guys – or are they straight? Can’t tell. Always older men anyway, not women. Lots of students – some French, some Spanish I think… from all over. A middle-aged guy in workman’s jacket. Furtive glances – is that guy to my left checking me out? He keeps staring. Now he’s getting up and coming towards me! Oh, he just wanted some water from the machine.

The staff – mainly nurses I guess – come and go. There’s a really sexy male nurse in blue uniform – I hope my friend gets him. No, I shouldn’t be thinking like that. Hey, that woman came in way after us and she’s just been called. Oh shit, I think I know that guy that’s just walked up to the desk… please don’t turn around…

As you sit there, time stretching on forever and your arse starting to ache, it occurs to you that, gay, striaight, bi, young, old, married, single, black, white, mother, attractive, not-so… at some point we all end up at the local sexual health clinic. There’s no judgement inside and we’re all there because of choices we’ve made about sex. It might not exactly be the ideal way to achieve it, but that’s true equality, right there.

Merry Christmas and a happy New Year.

The play was a one-man show about different aspects of gay life – all played out stark-bollock naked. I have to admit to being persuaded by a sexy poster and assumed it would be a packed house. How wrong I was…

The theatre is above a pub and we arrived about ten minutes before the performance start time to find a deserted bar and a locked theatre door. Maybe the entire audience was stuck in traffic? We got our drinks, positioned ourselves with a good view of the entrance, and waited. We heard three other guys (all on their own and all older) come in and quietly ask at the bar about the gay play upstairs – the dirty mac brigade had arrived.

In the end there were eight of us (including the actor) in a theatre designed for about sixty. It was already dark when we walked in and the few shadowy figures dotted the edges. We didn’t want to sit right at the front – the actor could be really hung! – nor at the back and look too cruisy.

The actor wasn’t that hung and the experience wasn’t voyeuristic or titillating (mind you, at one point he seemed to get pretty aroused himself). Although he had used his naked body (with a carefully placed sticker) on the poster, I now see why he hadn’t featured his face, disguising this old queen’s age in the process. I’m sure with a packed audience there would have been a proper buzz in the room, but it was so quiet that I got a disapproving glance from the actor when I sucked my gin and tonic a bit noisily through my straw.

I couldn’t identify much with the acted-out gay experiences, feeling as though most came from a different era and probably from the guy’s past. There was a lot of use of the word ‘poof’ – who says ‘poof’ these days? An even older queen in the audience who really was wearing a dirty mac was laughing approvingly though.

On to the pub. We didn’t want to go far in the pissing rain so ducked into a real old-fashioned gay establishment where you’re likely to be called ‘duck’ or ‘duckie’. I’d only been in this particular pub once before, years ago, and it hadn’t changed a bit. I think the same staff were serving and probably the same customers were ordering. It’s one of those places where any guy under the ago of about 40 is lustingly eyed-over as chicken meat – which can feel kind of nice when you’re not 18 any more.

We ordered our drinks and the barman called me ‘dear’; we sat down in a corner, most eyes still upon us. I looked around at the sad decor and the raunchy pictures and there was one thing that had changed: this place used to be packed on a Saturday night and now it wasn’t even a quarter full. I’m sure this wasn’t just because of the rain – the loyal drinkers are aging with the pub and the younger guys just walk on by.

I find myself with contradicting feelings about the threatened extinction of this particular shade of gay life, the people and places that are a hangover from the days when the scene was a much more underground, seedy and risky playground. Gay people aren’t as segregated or back-street-dwelling anymore and want trendy, fashionable night spots just like everybody else. But it would be a shame if this flavour of gay was lost forever – it’s good to have a bit of shabby, shifty, seediness every now and then; it’s where all us poofs come from.

The other big advantage of coming out as bisexual – which some people regard as a cop-out – is that there isn’t the same baggage attached to it. If a male celebrity, who’s probably had plenty of whispers about him, finally comes out as gay, suddenly it’s all about buggery and the public now see him as camp, a bit girly and special interest, even if he’s as hard as Mike Tyson – their years of cultivated image is straight down the pan.

Being bisexual doesn’t have the same associations and is much more of a mystery to a lot of people – probably where this distrust on both sides comes from. So it’s far easier for a celeb to bolt this onto their current public persona and, if your record sales start to dip, you’ve left the closet door open just enough to slip back and marry a supermodel without raising too many eyebrows… David Bowie.

I say the battle for openly gay celebs is lost, at least for now and until the majority of people can think outside the pink box. I say we need more bisexual celebs – hundreds/thousands of them – with straight celebs coming out as bi as a way of support. This mass onslaught of ambiguous sexuality by public figures would be too much for small minds to take and they would explode, barriers would be broken on a massive scale and nobody would care anymore, because it would be too difficult to divide people into easy groups.

The fight could then be taken to the grass roots level with as many people as we can get putting their signature to the Big Bi List – if you’re gay, suddenly announce to everyone that you’re now bisexual; get your straight friends and family to do it. Then maybe we can all just get over it, realise we’re not that different and move on.

The holiday apartments themselves are family-run and very functional. Thinking we were close enough to a bit of 21st Century civilization, we weren’t expecting the raised eyebrows and barely concealed smirks when we checked in to our home for the next ten days – obviously not a hot-bed of gay vacationing, this place. The old guy who escorted us to our apartment in the nearby block stated loudly when we entered that, “it’s a double bed,” waiting for us to protest that we booked a twin room… No, no, we’re a gay couple and WILL be having sex on that bed.

Once the unpacking was done we consoled ourselves that, being self-contained, we needn’t have much to do with the staff. Spoke too soon there! It was one thing after another: a light-bulb went; no hot water; one of the keys kept sticking in the lock… This meant frequent trips to the deserted reception office (part of their family home), ringing the bell and waiting forever for someone to appear. It got better, though, because they seemed to be leaving everything to the young son. He must have been late teens/early twenties, blond, sun-kissed from all the surf and toned from all the manual work. As the holiday went on we noticed him more and more: topless up ladders; topless working on his car; topless laying bricks and topless outside our window – I thought to myself, if you’re gonna lay bait for the gays, why not welcome them when they show up?

If we felt alien at the holiday camp, this was nothing compared to walking through the local area. We had some really nice day trips out and the picturesque town I mentioned earlier had a lot do see, but to get anywhere by foot or bus we had to first venture down into our own, not-so-pretty town. It’s the kind of shitty, inbred place where they all wear tracksuits and nobody’s used to seeing openly gay people walking about freely. Waiting for the half-hour late, daily bus at the side of the main road, I’ve never felt so much like a circus attraction. Every car that went past – children, youths, adults, old people – they were all craning their necks to look at the two of us, some people actually slowing down! Did we really look so from-out-of-space? Admittedly, I was wearing a pink t-shirt, but still.

We did manage to have a good time and most of the places we visited weren’t as backward as our vacation spot, but it is nice to be home and feel normal again.