London | A Walk To Brixton Station

Open the door. Look down: see the ginger cat with sky-blue blue collar who makes a bed of the planter by the front step. She flees, hissing, down the garden path – follow her but watch your hair; the thorny arms of the rose bush are overgrown and reach overhead in a long arch. The postman caught his forehead on one last week and gave me a telling off, which I was determined not to feel guilty about because A) it’s not my fault that plants grow and B) he should watch where he’s going.

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France | Good Times

I was very careful, ahead of my hiking weekend with Seth in France, to avoid doing anything that might cause me injury. I took it easy in the gym, I skipped leg day (hiking’s no fun with sore thighs), I ate well, I rested. Acutely aware of my luck with such things, I took every precaution to preserve my bodily health; I didn’t want anything to spoil my big, restorative weekend away in the Occitanie countryside – and god, I needed it after so many months of solid work in London’s great metropolitan marsh. God must have a wicked sense of humour, however, because the evening before my flight, my phone rang. It was Seth.

“Mate, you’re not gonna believe this. I’ve smashed my feet up at work.”

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Berlin | Back in Town Pt 4

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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California 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).

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