Yuri and the Sausage Size Contest

Long Island, June 2009

In June 2009, Yuri flies back to the States for a two-week visit. He hasn't been back since he moved to London in 2005, although I went out to visit him two years ago.


We meet at JFK, and then drive to a townhouse on Powers Street in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, where we will stay with his ex-boyfriend Daniel, a history professor into Beat poetry and jazz.

Daniel is a buffed daddy in his 40s, balding, bearded, with thick hard muscles and a few piercings.

He has two roommates:

Brandon, a tall, slim twink with a round face, a bright smile, and olive skin, maybe Hispanic or Asian, a nurse at a hospital nearby.

Tighe (pronounced Teeg), a gym rat in his 30s, rather short with curly red hair and a short beard, who doesn't have a job but does all of the cooking and cleaning to cover his share of the rent.


On the first night, we're too tired from our trip to do anything more than go out to dinner, watch tv, and go to bed.

In the morning, Yuri and I take the subway into Manhattan to check out the Strand Bookstore, my old gym, Christopher Street, Central Park, and the Museum of Natural History. We return in time for some brief cruising at the Metropolitan before the dinner party.

Daniel and the two roommates are there, plus:

Liam, the boy who gave me a present on his 18th birthday back in 2000, still a cute blond twink, slim and a little swishy.

My friend Barry, the Colonial Williamsburg boy, in his 30s, with a slim compact frame and a square Eastern European face.

His boyfriend, another Daniel (sorry), in his 50s, short-haired, very buffed, with a hairy chest.