On our final full day in Berlin (Vic leaving that night, me early next morning), Vic and I met Bruna for brunch at a funky upbeat restaurant somewhere in Friedrichshain. I had a bacon sandwich and we talked about sex clubs in the city and how we’d all be far too prudish to join an orgy. I never knew I had a ‘line’ until I lived in Berlin. The city tests your limits – you can always go deeper, and nobody ever recommends you don’t. Sooner or later there comes a time when you’re faced with a situation you’ve never seen before, far beyond what you considered possible in the ‘real world’ beyond, and for the first time your mental green light switches to yellow then red – and you pause. And that’s it: you either turn back forever, or plunge in. Some people go to Kitkat and get their thighs spanked with a riding crop for the first time and think ‘Ow, get off’. And others – their irises turn to love hearts.
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Berlin | Back in Town Pt 3
The next morning Vic and I went for breakfast in a little German bakery that sold giant rectangular cakes the size of bricks. We walked to Moritzplatz and up the road past the infamous club Kitkat; I pondered aloud to Vic how, if one could invent some sort of gadget that detected historic orgasms per square metre, the machine would hit the roof when you passed the area. Further down the road we arrived at the giant industrial building that houses Tresor, Ohm (where I watched Annie play a set back in the day) and Kraftwerk – a gargantuan events space inside the gutted husk of a power station.
Continue readingBerlin | Back In Town Pt 2
I woke up to my first hangover of 2025 (not counting the weird fraudulent hangovers I get from 0% beer for reasons which continue to elude me) and sat up in bed and said hello to Vic who was awake in a separate bed parallel to mine like Ernie and/or Bert. We got ready and went outside to begin our day.
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Because I’m an idiot and have no money I booked a cheap flight out of London to Berlin which required me to wake up at one in the morning on a Thursday and take a taxi into central London and then a bus from central London to Stansted Airport with the whole thing taking two point five hours and costing me half the price again of the actual flight which of course I was thrilled about.
Continue readingLondon | Steadily Healthier
I raised my prices today – for my lessons. That’s not particularly interesting for you, probably, but it’s a milestone for me we’ve got to start somewhere. Actually we’ll start here: I’m two months sober. I don’t really like the phrasing of that, makes me sound like a crackhead, but well, maybe I was a bit, back in the day. Not crack but – plenty of other stuff. I stopped drinking after New Year’s Eve with the intention of going three months without. Since I was 14 I don’t think I’ve ever gone anywhere near that long – and I started to worry that my life was not as glorious as it might be and more tragic that it need be. I find myself underwhelmed by years of drinking and the knock-on effects it has on every little thing: that being discipline, money, body fat, anxiety, skin, hair, teeth, motivation and the great sapping-away of TIME.
Continue readingCalifornia Pt 11 | Sea Lights
We said goodbye to Annie’s parents in the morning, and I wrote them a letter to say thank you for everything: thank you for the food, thank you for the hospitality, and thank you more than anything for creating the rare delight that is my friend. We set off back to Oakland in the morning, full of breakfast and with a clear sky overhead. First, however, Annie wanted to show me Las Gatos and the area she grew up (which was news to me because I thought we were already in Los Gatos but whatever).
Continue readingCalifornia Pt 7 | Vesuvio
I hadn’t expected Kerouac Alley and the bookshop to move me so much; the emotion of it all took me by surprise. Truth be told, I don’t often think about Kerouac these days. I read other authors, other genres, and when I write I don’t try to sound like him anymore; I feel I’ve found my own style, more or less. I had my phase and I moved on – left it behind, along with all the other stuff I left in my twenties, voluntary or otherwise. But despite all that, being there did something to me – something visceral. It felt exactly how watching the Lion King on TV feels, even after all these years: it felt like nostalgia, it felt like loss, it felt warm, it felt like a hug.
Continue readingCalifornia Pt 6 | City Lights
I’d written off the 25th of November long before I ever got the plane to California. The day after Annie’s birthday party, I’d imagined, would be an empty one: spinning heads and groaning and human duvet-mounds shuffling back and forth between sofa, bathroom and fridge.
Continue readingCalifornia Pt 5 | Stork
Because of my tendency to roam around, I have only celebrated one of Annie’s birthdays with her since we met: her 23rd. That birthday party – which involved acid tabs, public nudity, rooftop falls, a dildo covered in glitter, leather harnesses and quite a lot of blood – was, it’s safe to say, the reason for my anxiety on the morning of her 30th birthday party in Oakland.
Continue readingCalifornia Pt 3 | In ‘n’ Out
The ‘bomb cyclone’ beating up the west coast intensified on the second day of my visit: silver sheets of rain coming down, pooling on street corners and running rivers around the wheels of parked cars – leaves and newspapers and single flip-flops floating by forlornly, coming to standstills halfway up driveways or plastered across kerbs. The greens and reds of traffic lights and headlights blurred over sodden asphalt, drawing down buildings and billboards into long strange reflections.
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