Happy New Year 2007

I’m sure I’m not the only blogger using the eve of 2007 as a reason to reflect on the past year. 2006 has been an interesting year for me – I’ve finished school for good, and hopefully left behind some of the pettiness and homophobia that is all to present throughout the education system – with both teachers, non teaching staff, and pupils. I’ve moved to England for further study, and it’s so far been everything I thought it would be. The independence afforded is something I highly recommend to all lesbian/gay young people who feel their home situation restricts their social life.

Aside from the educational and practise elements of the past year, I think I’m in a very different position now than I was last year. I try not to use reference points to judge the state of my life, because I think that nostalgia will always leave the judgement unbalanced.

This time last year I wrote:

The future is also unbelievably humbling. There is nothing to bring a lump to your throat quite like the confusion it presents. This time next year, I have no idea what I’ll be doing, where I’ll be. Change doesn’t necessarily scare me, but the passing of time does. I’m not worried about the future – just uncertain.

Again I can say, this time next year, I don’t know how my life will really stand. I don’t know what people will have moved into my life and changed it all, and I don’t know who will not be part of the life I’ll choose to live. I could claim I’m certain of the future, but if we do that it is certain that there will be obstacles to change plans.

I like to think that I’ve grasped 2006 as I said I would. For too long in my past I have failed to grasp what has since passed me by.

I wish you luck with whatever you plan to do, and whatever you do in 2007.

Just make sure you take time to grasp 2007.

At Home With The Bird

For many LGBT people, Christmas and New Year can be a trying time. I know it certainly is for me. It’s the time when many people head ‘home’ – if you can call that place you grew up, that houses your parents and siblings ‘home’. It’s the time of year when you have to ring your loved one quietly at 3am, and sneak stamps from the book to send them letters.

At least, that’s my experience so far this Christmas. I know it’s terribly scrooge of me, but I am counting the days till I’m away from this place. It’s not that I don’t like home, and my family aren’t really so terrible, but it’s just hard to come back to the place where I have to hide myself again.

I often wonder how my gay friends really feel about going home, how they act with their family, and if they are counting the days as avidly as me. Not that I act differently, but you know what I mean. I’m not the same socialite at home as I am with a group of adoring friends.

I know some people have families who are accepting, and who they enjoy going home to. I’m a little jealous of that, but I don’t even really know how I’d feel if my parents weren’t how they are. I know there are also other people who, for a variety of reasons, have no home to visit – and as much as I might pretend I’d like that, I know that in my heart I wouldn’t like it at all.

It does seem a shame that you have to spend the campest time of year with ‘the folks’. Their enthusiasm for tinsel and ‘The Sound of Music’ just isn’t enough to replace my gay male friends.

Wherever you are spending your holidays, and whoever with, try not to throw a turkey in frustration. The bird has suffered enough.

What Lesbians Want

Lesbians flirt, that much is usually true. Many lesbians flirt shamelessly, I have been on the receiving end of many shockingly bad passes. Some were quite funny, more often than not when they were meant to be serious. But I’m not talking about lesbians flirting with lesbians, or even straight women, I’m talking about lesbians flirting with men.

It does sound slight ludicrous when I think of it like that, but I am quite serious. Lesbians, like all women often flirt with men for gain. It’s one of the most simple formulae. Men want to help damsels in distress, even if the damsel has a skinhead and a pair of dungarees. Who do you call if you want someone to pick up that ridiculously heavy box? Probably not your favourite fag.

How does a lesbian flirt with a heterosexual male? The same way a heterosexual female does really. We’re all blessed with that ‘I want’ tone, I know I use it perhaps more than I should really. The poor men, even in the modern world, still feel bound by some chivalrous duty. Maybe they are just flattered at the hint of sexual tension with someone unattainable. Maybe they are just thick?

When I asked my girlfriend why she thought some lesbians flirt with men, she replied ‘Free beer’. And that’s partially true – men can’t resist trying to drink a lesbian under the table. So maybe there is no other reason than that they are just thick.
Whatever the reason they fall for it, lesbians know they fall for it.

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas my little bloggers. I trust in this season of goodwill, forgiveness and glutony, you will find it in your hearts to forgive my absence which I am blaming on just having gotten out of the way of blogging.

New Years resolution should perhaps be to continue blogging... I've come too far to pack this in now.

Home Time

As you might have noticed I've finally found some time to catch up with my blog. Any of you who are aware that I study in England and live in Northern Ireland could easily attribute this to me being home for the Christmas holidays - and you're not wrong.

Various patronising adults who seems not to realise my age now have gazed at me sadly, preaching that the first time you come home for the holidays is the hardest, blah blah. As much as I'd love to prove them wrong by saying I am ecstatic to be home, I must admit that in many ways I fear they may be right. However I still express a slightly arrogant doubt that being chucked out of independent land back to parents 24 hour surveillance land will ever be particularly easy.

Perks of being home are quite materialistic - free washing machine, and woman to do the washing, posh food that isn't Asda Smartprice, posh food cooked and served, someone to hoover my room and generally clean up after me. These perks come at a high cost. I am expected to occasionally do the above tasks myself, and in payment for all of the above (and the finanacial support of the folks throughout university), I am expected to be at their every call, and my social life must be restricted, lest they feel I am enjoying myself too much. My friends are also vetted, and regular quizes on precisely what I do when I'm not under their watchful eye are a daily occurance.

What then does Straight Talker miss about England? I'm quite sure it's not the workload, the early morning lectures on a monday or the 5.30pm lectures on a Friday. It's quite obviously the social elements - new friends from different places, bar crawls with no parent standing with the breathaliser and demanding to know exactly why I am wobbling in at 4am. I miss my flat mates, my girlfriend, heading out with the LGBTA without having to lie about where I'm going. Playing football without my mother standing on the sidelines frowning.

What do I miss? Indepenence.

Leicester Gay Scene Guide

I've finished my first term in Leicester, so it seems fitting that having already provided a guide to the gay scene in Belfast here, I figured that I would provide a guide to the gay scene in Leicester, where I now am for University. I must admit that as someone coming from backward Northern Ireland, I was expecting a much larger gay scene in Leicester, and was initially disappointed. However it’s my own fault for not going to a bigger city, and overall I am happy with bustling gay scene. The freedom afforded by my parents not breathing over my shoulder has allowed me to fully appreciate the bars, more so perhaps then I have ever done in Belfast.

Rainbow and Dove:
Have to say, I do rather like this place. Drinkies can be a tad on the expensive side, but Monday is ‘Pink Pound’ night, and that usually makes me wobble in a merry way. Recently refurbished (again), it’s quite classy. Voted one of the best pubs in the midlands, the bar staff are friendly to boot. Lots of camp classics to tap your toes too, and even the odd disco light. One of my fave bars in the city.

The Dover Castle:
Apparently the Uks oldest gay bar, and if too many lights are on, it looks it. Still, not half bad for a night out. Seems to have lots of resident drag queens who’ve gone OTT with the sequins. Has a reasonably sized dance floor, pool tables and drinks aren’t too very expensive.

Bossa:
Technically a cocktail bar. Very small, but on one of the main streets. Wednesday is half price cocktail night, so you can get a good deal. Yummy cocktails from a reasonably extensive menu. Bar staff have only been rude to me once (on my first night, the scum bag). Lots of little tables a la France. The Bloody Mary made my nose run.

Amber:
Rather classy little place, which hasn’t been open long. It can be expensive, but they often have offers, which aren’t bad. The toilet is a bit weird (in that you walk down a never-ending corridor to get there). Lots of comfy leather sofas and stainless steel, you know the type.. Us students tend to be slightly intimidated by the slightly older crowd. It seems to be a sip quietly place.

Streetlife:
Gay club – not bad if you’re sober, but maybe better if you’ve had a few. Big dancing area, but most people tend to just dance in the downstairs bar area. Drinks aren’t cheap, but then it is a club. Still amazed by the carpet in the dancing area, and the glitter on the walls, but overall not a bad place.

Anyone from Leicester may condemn me for not mentioning Quebec, Leicester’s other (smaller club), but I have to say thus far I haven’t been. When I have I’ll update this.