Race Around the World - Location 10

In the previous leg of Superchilled Race Around the World we took you to the inside of the Guggenheim Museum in New York City, as correctly guessed by Monsieur Le Monty, not the entry for our new home in Stanwell Park as suggested by the ever grandiose Craig, prizes will be coming your ways.

Location 10, photographed above, is the next stage in our tour around the world. Have you been here? Know where it is? I want specifics. Again if you have a photo with yourself here - bonus points - email it and I'll post it. Be creative and you too can be in the running, and Craig, no it isn't the garden for the new Palace De L'Stanwell Parc.

The race begins NOW.

What's up doc?

They're not especially common, but when they happen - they make you stop and think. My patient had symptoms that really didn't fit most common things when I saw him on Monday, and scanning identified a brain tumour, not unlike the one in this picture, fitting his symptoms. He's off to the neurosurgeon today and may have a hole in his head by the end of the week. I bet he didn't think this would be on his agenda for this week. Grab life by the horns, next week's blog post is just as unpredictable for all of us...

More A&F distractions

I'm not really the wrestling kinda guy, but it's been another busy day at work and any distraction will do to take my mind off work things. And this is a good distraction. ( I think it lasts 30-40seconds)

Superchilled Guide to Coming Out

Oh, and by the way mum, I’m gay, can you pass me the milk?

It’s something you can only do once, so like an entrance at the Academy Awards you want to do it right.

Here’s the Superchilled Guide to Coming out.

Preparation:
Its not just YOU who has to prepare – you have to prepare those you’re coming out to as well – and this isn’t just a matter of ‘sit down, I have something to tell you’ . A proper coming out involves months of planning, re-programming (if required) and sensitive timing for those who are going to be given news that they may or may not be expecting (the coming outees).

Suggested re-programming techniques:
For those new to the whole idea that homosexuality exists – it might be wise to introduce them to movies that have gay side themes or characters (that aren’t advertised in the trailers or on the dvd covers). Shortbus while fantastic, is probably best saved for years after you’ve come out and your family is mostly deceased, or have come out themselves. But for other movies you can look on in surprise at the gay kiss, or the introduction of the boyfriend, and say things such as ‘well I’ll be…’. Ideally your parents or other coming outees will have someone else they know who is gay and hopefully they like or get on with – encourage their interaction with them, and note local well known people who are respected and gay (that they might not know to be gay) on passing in conversation from time to time. Responses such as ‘bloody poofters’, and such should be greeted with calm reassurance, ‘no mum, they’re not ALL that bad you know, I know some people who are gay’ and revisiting the dvd collection as above…

Remember you’ve had years to come to terms with it – you need to help them along – unless of course you generally dress like you’ve come from a Mardi Gras Parade Float and they’re more ready than you.

Your Own Preparation
You don’t need to look your best, so grooming is not an essential here – in fact it might give you away too early. Find something to wear that clashes until you’re really ready. Ideally you will be absolutely certain that you’re gay – and if you have any doubt then you probably are. Any perception from your coming outees that you’re ‘not sure’ will be greeted with enrolment in de-gaying camps, pseudo-psychological intervention and a parade of women in the hope that you just need to find ‘the right one’. So at least look sure (perfect grooming may help here). Of course having a boyfriend to introduce may well be a little more of a statement of certainty, but for the moment of truth – keep them away – you want them to remain in one piece and not have ‘you gayed my son, you bloody poofter’ yelled at them. If you live with the coming outees it might be worth making sure you have somewhere to stay in the event of the ‘worst case scenario’ – it rarely happens – but at least know your options.

The Big Day
You’ve done the ground work and now you’re ready – what’s the best time? It will depend – but you want to have control over the environment, so make sure you have time, no interruptions and a captive audience. If you’re worried about violent outbursts – choose a quiet café or restaurant in a public setting. One on One is recommended – because it’s more personal and gives non talkers a chance to talk, and you want them to talk – the worst coming out is when you are greeted with silence. Make sure you have information available – sometimes something to read about sexuality, PFLAG contact numbers, and in a perfect setting have the coming outee’s gay contacts informed and ready for debriefing sessions afterwards. Information on gay discrimination, HIV etc is probably best left for another time, one trauma at a time please. Make sure you know your exits. Just in case.

Warnings
As you get used to coming out – it can be wise to avoid become to laid back about it. I came out to a friend casually while he was taking my new car for a spin (he did ask about the guy who happened to be my boyfriend – and I figured it was a perfect introduction to the topic) but only do this if your insurance is up to date. En masse can be a lot easier – less time needed etc, but it might make for a very seriously altered dinner party, and you run the risk of the silent escaper, someone who REALLY needs talking to, who might not return your calls later.

You Made It!!
All in all you’ll find that you wished you had come out sooner. But never regret the delay – just realise in advance it can be a fantastic opportunity. You can become very much closer to the people around you who have been excluded from your real emotional perspectives for a while, and after you get the first few people out of the way, timing the coming out can be a real hoot. A camera for reactions might make for a fun coming out blog after all!. Once you’re all done you, yourself might become a role model others can drop into their own coming out experience…

Ah the humanity of it all!!

Strange Sightings No.2

Following on from strange sighting no. 1...

At Cook & Philip Park pool on Sunday I was showering after my swim and a guy walks in to the shower with an entire SCUBA outfit including tanks, wetsuit, the works... and showers - completely geared up...

I can hardly wait to see what happens when I go swimming this evening!

A&F Distraction

I've had a hellish morning at work - so it's time for some gratuitous Abercrombie & Fitch distraction. Enjoy! 1min34sec

Superchilled Race Around the World - Location 9

After posting location 8 in Superchilled Race Around the World - which was the Esplanade Hotel in Fremantle, Western Australia, it took a whole of what seemed like 3 seconds for Peter von Amsterdam to enter and win with the correct details for that leg of the race. There were no entries for most creative because, well, I guess it was a hotel - nothing ever happens at hotels... Congrats Peter, winning yet again!

So Today we have Location 9. Have you been here? Know where it is? Have a photo of yourself here? Bonus points if you do! Have no idea? Be creative - make up a convincing story

and win!

Anyone can race - you don't need to be a blogger - no ID fingerprinting nor iris scans required.

The race starts.... NOW

Swimwear Etiquette

Where is it okay to be semi-naked?
This is speedo ettiquette 1.01, funny (45seconds : work safe)

BSB & the weekend

I said I'd get to bed early - but that was meant to be pre-midnight... oh well.
Here are some images (above) from Sunday afternoon at the bakery. Great time as usual, then 'The Lives of Others' at the movies - a German film certainly worth a look, powerful and moving. Thanks guys for a great afternoon / evening. Bed is calling - and really loudly - so I'm off. The week begins again! I need to be awake for it.

The Man Date

Why do straight men have so much trouble spending time together?

Today’s Sydney Morning Herald ‘Good Weekend’ explores 'The Man Date', based on the New York Times article from earlier this month. (click here for the full NYT article) It seems that 90% of the sober male population has difficulty socialising amongst themselves if it doesn’t involve some kind of business or sport. Going one-on-one with a man for a meal, a walk in the park, to see some art or cinema is fraught with stress.

The concern about being perceived as gay is one of the major complications of socializing one on one, many straight men acknowledge.

Women can do it together without a second thought, and gay guys do it all the time, in fact gay men can ‘man date’ with men AND with women, interacting one on one about things that matter, or things that don’t – just spending time together. And that’s where the straight men lose out again – any date they have with a woman almost always has more than just friendship in mind (ask any woman – that’s why gay men are so popular with women), and their dates with men seem just too riddled with restrictions and embarrassments.

Cooking for a friend at home violates the man date comfort zone for almost everyone, with a possible exemption for grilling or deep-frying. "The grilling thing would take away the majority of the stigma because there is a masculine overtone to the grill," Mr. Discher said.

It’s scary. Another reason that I’m glad I’m gay!

I personally find the interaction I have one on one with my male and female friends some of the most rewarding times I can spend, and I very much look forward to them. I guess I don’t have to worry about people thinking that I’m gay, nor that I’m trying to seduce the women. It engenders a relaxed and more open environment in which anything can and will be discussed, barriers broken, taboos challenged...

Maybe we should all invite a straight male friend for a one on one dinner and introduce them to a whole other world…

always - ad

I don't have shares in the company, I don't drink the stuff, and I even recommend that my patients don't drink it, but some of the ads are priceless, as is this oldie but fave from way back. Catchy too - you'll have the tune going through your head all day. It's a graphic design thing this one, so no cute men to be seen I'm afraid.

Strange Sightings No.1

After my regular morning swim at the uni pool today I was getting changed when two twentysomething guys walked into the change room - it looked like they'd been doing some kind of exercise, but not swimming. They undressed down to their underwear, then promptly stepped into the open shower, and showered WITH their underwear on. And it stayed on, when I left they were still wearing their wet and sagging underwear as they dried off...

I thought that was only something for underwear ads, mind you one of them was cute, but still, it's just wrong.

Superchilled Race Around the World - Location 8

You've all been waiting for it - now here it is - Leg 8 of Superchilled Race Around the World. Can you identify where this picture is taken? As previously, prizes are awarded to the person who gets the answer right first and the most creative answer in by the time I'm ready to make a decision. Fittingly for a Friday it's a Hotel - but who will be able to meet there for drinks after work?

Rules of Attraction

In one of my opening posts, with a pic of Brad Pitt as my example, I pondered the cult of celebrity, and being 'cool'. Today I'm throwing Angelina into the mix, more specifically in her role as Lara Croft - Tomb Raider, because she is quite consistently one of the characters that many gay men find incredibly sexy - in a way they frequently don't with most women. Now I know not everyone will agree with this, but sitting here in my no. 6 on the Kinsey Scale, I know there is truth in it. It might be her masculinity (interestingly coupled with quite some femininity), the fact that she's playing a typically male role (and some will find triggers to memories of Raiders of the Lost Ark...) or maybe she's just universally sexy. Perhaps its just the accent she does for the role, I do love accents... Maybe the straight or not-so-gay men and women reading this might like to shed some light on the matter. I also personally find Cameron Diaz quite sexy in a similar way - but I'm not quite sure how I can explain it - I'm certainly not falling off the gay wagon, but if either of them were in the next wagon passing by - I know I'd be tempted...

Location 7 - the winners

This leg of the race has been won by a new entrant, Anonymous Neil, who correctly identified Kitzilano Pool in Vancouver from my photograph. Peter von Amsterdam sent in the picture below from his helicopter vantage point. It shows more clearly why it is one of my favourite pools, the 137.5m length creates difficulty calculating how far you've swum, but is quite unique, (they do have markers every 25m on the floor of the pool to let you know where you're at).

Geoff d'Vancouver also correctly identified the other reason for its popularity - THE MEN - abounding in and around it. In my photo, which was a merging of a few individual photos, you get to see one cute man twice - from the front and back as he walked from one end to the other during my photographing. (or was that the reason for the multiple photos..? hmm)

To maintain diplomatic ties, Geoff d'Vancouver gets the prize for, um living in Vancouver, and Peter von Amsterdam the research grant.

Sponsors for actual real prizes for superchilled race around the world are more than welcomed. Location 8: coming soon...

Jam Packed

There’s a little old Toyota Corolla hatch in our garage, jam packed so full of stuff that if you open a door things will literally pop out at you. I used all my Tetris skills and a little magic to load a life time of possessions into it, and even managed to create a kind of safety cage to prevent cargo from decapitating the driver in an emergency stop. It belongs to my good friend Lynnette, who tomorrow heads south to Tasmania to start anew. A few years ago when we first met – I would never have thought I would see this day.

I met Lynnette through her husband, the cute runner who I met at the uni pool (as you do). I didn’t know she existed until at least a month or so of meeting her hubby, when she came with him to breakfast at my regular Friday breakfast café near the beach. She was loud, opinionated, hated living in Australia (she was from the States), hated the beach and I was the first gay guy she had knowingly met. She was homophobic, somewhat religious, and one of the few people on the planet who really annoyed me (Craig will tell you a story about that…). She was an American other Americans cringed about, and Australians rolled their eyes about. But she didn’t go away. (Some times I wished she would). We did things together with them both, she came to gym and the pool, she became a breakfast regular on Fridays. We all went away on skiing weekends, and embarked on various adventures together.

As much as she annoyed me, she also challenged me. She made me analyse my reactions to things, my reasons for my decisions that I had made, and I guess as she challenged me, I also challenged her. Where other people would have given up and walked away – she persevered to find the root of any problem, and then analysed it and sorted it, regardless of barriers that may have been crossed or issues that may have arisen from it. Over time we both changed. We have become close and discuss all manner of topics very openly, and regularly. She has become my gym buddy of sorts, though she still avoids swimming almost as much as I avoid running. As a journalist she has now written articles supporting gay relationships, she has started to enjoy Australia, begun to enjoy the beach (although she is still a mountain girl), parted ways with her husband, won journalism awards, and become friends with more of my friends – gay and otherwise – as I have come to know more of hers. her blog is listed in my 'blogs to watch' - Along the way - I don’t see her husband much any more, I guess neither does she, but of the things that you can predict in life, that Lynnette would be the one staying here with us as she prepares to move on to a new part of her life, was not one of them.

She has become a friend where I was not expecting a friend, a close friend who will be missed.

I just hope she makes it to Tasmania without any car doors popping open.

Rainy Days

The rain has set in, in the land of the sun. We pray for rain one day - curse it the next. Our dams are emptying - yet the rain falls well away from them - and in bucket loads. Here's a pic from my balcony just minutes ago - a little rain explosion.

My favourite rainy day thing is to go swimming. I remember lazy summer days as a kid on school holidays we'd go camping on the Myall Lakes about 3 hours north of Sydney (although in those days it was more like 6 hours). I loved when it rained. We'd race out into warm lake and sit on or in whatever we had that floated, the rain pouring and reducing the waves on the lake to an enforced calm. Siblings and cousins all out in the water playing and splashing about. There was a silence that came with the rain - the lake would be empty of boats and water skiers, the water glassy, just the noise of us in our own world. Sometimes I'd go windsurfing on these days - it felt like you were the only one on the planet, gliding silently through the water...

And now I'm off for swim training.
I hope it pours.

What's YOUR favourite rainy day thing?

Who's a Barbie Guy?

It's an ad for condoms - (safe to watch at work) - made me laugh...

Race Around the World - Location 7

The Race is on. Being the avid swimmer I have a collection of favourite pools around the world. Here is one of them. Do you know where it is? (click on it for the larger view) There's also a kind of illusion in the image too - a nice one - can you identify it? Winners are the first correct, and most creative responses. Bonus points if you can tell me how long it is. See you at the deep end. Good luck!

race around the world leg 6: completed

Monsieur Le Monty has won leg 6 of Superchilled Race Around the World, correctly naming Bucharest, Romania as the location of the House of the People, pictured earlier: location 6, and above. Thanks for the detailed history, Monty. Craig is runner up, for reasons that will become obvious when you read his entry.

The next leg of superchilled race around the world kicks off shortly. Be ready.

New to superchilled and the race? Click on the 'race around the world' link below for the background. Photos I've taken from various locations on the planet will be posted - and your task is to correctly identify where they are - or to make some elaborate / entertaining guess. Everyone can and should enter - life is too short to sit on the sidelines.