Welcome to the Blog!

Posted on January 1, 2015 by

Scroll down for the latest posts!

sticky-2-readHowever, before you do:

This blog is for guys who admire other guys who put real effort into their physical development. It is NOT exclusively gay, but hopefully you will be gay-friendly.

tumblr_neimn2tEkV1qffcrao3_500The rules are simple:

  1. Make an effort to improve your own fitness this year (you’re NEVER too old);
  2. Enjoy the pictures (and comment please on what you see, and feel free to ‘FOLLOW’);
  3. Buy a book (preferably, all of them) to support the continuation of the blog!

The books (print and e-versions available) are about finding gay love, developing ourselves as acrobats, starting a family (yeah, I’m a gay dad and enormously proud of my teenage son!!), going on tour, meeting difficulties ‘head-on’ (they become a bit of a thriller as well). sticky-1-readLinks from all posts from September 2014 onwards will lead you to more information and potential purchase – they are in almost every post and either through clicking on images of the covers, or on the separate links when given!! And, as the image on the right clearly shows, you can follow all of these rules at one go…

The blog is essentially G-rated; the books get a little explicit from time to time about gay guys doing what gay guys do – you don’t have to be gay to enjoy them – just be gay-friendly. 

And now, as they used to say on the old TV game shows: “Come on Down!”⇓

*** Many pictures will enlarge if you click on them ***

 

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Droning On… Passing Through… Flying Off…

Posted on July 16, 2017 by

‘Droning On’ is what I tend to do here, to avoid just posting just fitness pix and book adverts (proofs of Let The Future Find Me have arrived for checking, by the way, as if I didn’t have enough to do at present!!).

Five action-packed days since the previous post – leaving summer camp (the old camping bus made it back to Oak Ridge without expiring, but its future is now under serious review by Karen and Clare); packing up the rest of our stuff (Dave and I for a ‘permanent’ move to Portugal, Leo and Jaymee for a two-week vacation with us)… a seriously ‘energetic’ send off  at the private gym (virtually an ‘all-nighter’) which did indeed start with weight training…

…then a lot of wrestling as each guy wanted a bout to “say goodbye”! I mean, faced with several dozen ripped and either sweaty or oily guys, you can’t really resist…

…and finally, just us and the rest of the Tuan Jie boys left alone in the smaller gym, splashing around in our own juices in the ‘wet pit’. That’s ten of us who have been sharing our gayness and our love physically for nearly 18 years, closely guarding our health through a vow to keep it ‘within the group’. Can Dave and I keep that up? Ethan and Jack did so during a two-year world trip, and we’re sure that we shall get plenty of visitors to our apartment for free vacations from the ‘team’… we just have to resist those Portuguese guys and the visitors to the leisure resort I guess!

We’ll be surrounded all day by fit guys minimally dressed – or indeed they have the option to train naked at certain hours – and the camp welcomes naturists either as family groups (opening this week) or in adult-only pairs/groups (opening two weeks later). Temptation indeed for we gay staff, but we’ll resist, I hope!

So, we got the flights via Chicago and “if its Saturday it must be Oxford UK” – a fleeting chance for two sets of parents/grandparents to catch up with us before we head to Gatwick airport (London) Sunday and on to Portugal. We know that the boxes of personal stuff we sent ahead have arrived – as well as the ‘show’ equipment, most of which got there before we left, so we’re ready for our dual roles of gym and entertainment managers (and, indeed, performers).

I sometimes wonder if writing about us enjoying training naked doesn’t come over as a bit, well, ‘over the top’. But being momentarily in the UK reminded us firstly that gay/straight-friendly naked gym sessions are regularly held in a gym in West London (a previous post contained a report on one) – sadly no time to explore one of their Sunday afternoon ‘gigs’. And then we noticed in a copy of The Times from earlier last week a report that the UK police were searching for the owner of a drone which had been flown over a family birthday party being celebrated outdoors “with naked teens and kids”. Not sure what they were doing (it must have been during the very hot weather, and maybe a pool was involved) but obviously there were no inhibitions amongst the young ‘uns about being ‘happy in their skins’ together, which is kind of cool when these days the opposite is so often the case. Pity about the sneaky drone presumably taking pictures, though – that’s the sort of interest in our freedoms that we don’t need.

I was reminded too of a BBC TV programme some while back featuring Baden-Powell’s first Scout Camp on Brownsea Island. Apparently some other ‘bigwig’ arrived (by boat, as the place was cut off at high tide and chosen so that the boys could explore nature to the heat’s content undisturbed):

The Visitor (horrified): “There are naked boys up trees!”

Baden-Powell: “Excellent!”

Our message is certainly “get out in the open air and enjoy!” – and if the location doesn’t support naked stuff then at least shuck the shirt and shoes…

The climate of the eastern Algarve does mean that half of each of our two gyms is in the open air – at least for most of the year…

…while free time can be spent in the open air (and shirtless) too – in the countryside…

…exploring local attractions…

…in the pool…

…on the beach…

…and just ‘getting around’…

As our friends said when we first discussed whether we might do this, ‘What’s not to like?’ Indeed. And we still have our own very personal ‘down time’, of course…

I don’t think that we’ll have much time for reading in bed… although I hope you will! The new book is pretty different from the first three – mainly fiction, although it reads like fact, based on a character we briefly knew: that will be coming soon.

So ‘goodbye’ until we are settled back into our new jobs and home, entertaining our two teens and introducing them to the local lads and girls. Just a couple more pics to finish off.

Love doing twisting sit-ups to define the abs! And this lad is letting us see his at work. “Excellent!” (with apologies to B-P!!!)

PS: isn’t that one everyone’s image of the Algarve?!! “Excellent!!”

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Putting the Kettle On

Posted on July 11, 2017 by

…that’s partly a message to my mum as a reminder that we’re passing through Oxford at the end of the week on the way to Portugal! But, mainly, it’s about these:

…the kettlebell. A great device for working on those abdominal muscles through various swinging and twisting actions.

…as well as exercising pretty much any other part of the body…

…and, of course, should you become bored during your workout and be of acrobatic bent…

My son Leo has had a collection of kettlebells for two years now and hates being separated from them. And being, like the rest of his extended family a ‘professional’ fakir performer, I guess that having one dropped onto his stomach while lying on a bed of nails just comes naturally.

It is, of course, desirable to build the muscle (with or without kettlebells) before attempting such strange feats!

…so maybe don’t try it home unless you abs look at least as good as these!

In fact (ADVISES OUR LAWYER!) don’t try it at home anyway. But this morning Leo and Chris were training this move when the lads from NC showed up (a little late after a tough day yesterday) and, of course, all wanted to try, so Dave and I needed to intervene and recommend smaller weights, at least for starters. But those boys are tough kids and there were survivors.

So may, just work on your abs for now.

Kids always want to go for the toughest feats first, only to be disappointed when it doesn’t happen straight off. An example is the ‘double handstand’, which Dave and I struggle with even now. One handstand on top of another. The first stage is for the lower hand-stander to take the weight of his partner…

When the base is really confident about balancing his moving partner, the top can go through straddle into the full top handstand, or through planche – or muscle up directly with a body fold… to this really impressive result:

But first, spend 10,000 hours getting your basic handstand shape and endurance right!

…and don’t forget to stretch your feet (this gymnast is obviously too busy balancing on thumb and fingertips to remember to do that!).

OK – what else to report? Yesterday was a kind of ‘going native’ day for the kids here at summer camp – building bivouacs in which to spend the night, lighting fires, eating under-cooked baked potatoes and sausage, getting covered in mud and then, around midnight, getting soaking wet when the latest thunderstorm arrived. Understandably the bivouacs all leaked and it was a case of all hands to the pumps (as it were), to repatriate the kids to their real beds – in the dark, in the rain, and persuading them to go through the showers on the way in to get them clean! Oh yes, and ‘putting the kettle on’ to make them hot coffees. Come this morning, they seem to be grateful for the assistance we and the other camp ’employees’ gave them but, at the time, ‘grumpy’ was hardly the word for it. Our camping bus was nearest to the bivouac area when it all started, so we ended up as ‘first responders’! Now we have to clean all the muddy footprints out of the bus…

We have had plenty of adventures along the way, as reported in my books, but getting filthy muddy and soaking wet in the middle of the night is a new one I think.

Random abs pix to finish off, I think – and first, training those abs with just the bodyweight:

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Final Fling at Summer Camp

Posted on July 9, 2017 by

Our last days at summer camp – we shall leave on Wednesday with 48 hours to get ourselves ready to return to Europe. Amazing where the time has gone this summer – and yet the schools in Europe are still in session and about to break for the summer whereas US kids have to go back early August.

A strange time for all of us, really – Jaymee and Leo will join us in Portugal (via UK grandparents!) for two weeks and then fly back to the States to resume their school and training lives with their moms – but not their dads. We shall be running our gyms and managing entertainment for the new complex which is about to receive its first visitors – slightly bad timing relative to the summer season because their building program overran a bit – but worked out perfectly for Dave and I.

So, gym pictures for the remainder of this post (and what a perfect young man this next one is!):

Leo and his best mate Chris, here with us at camp, have made six new friends from NC who it turns out are as fanatical about fitness as they are – they’ve been joining our ‘family’ dawn workouts including trying acro as well as weights and swimming – and getting hooked on submission wrestling too (to the extent that I overheard one call out to Leo – “You gotta be naked so I can try for a ball grab!”) – Ahem! I resist the temptation to post a picture of that… though they may be flying around on certain Instagram accounts!

That image (above) is entitled ‘well-equipped’ and applies equally to the guy and to the gym! Pull-ups (or indeed pull-downs) behind the neck are superb for developing the upper back, especially the rhomboids.

Here’s a gym which is obviously just free weights – no machines in sight and not even a bench… but the star lifter seems to be doing OK:

That is what this summer camp session has all been about – encouraging more youngsters to think about fitness while trying to make it ‘fun’ with acrobatic experiments… and a bit of showing off from us and especially from the kids. Thankfully our two (and their friends) never try the ‘look what I can do – I’m better than you’ attitude – it is all about encouraging others to train harder and achieve the same things. Just hope that they keep up that attitude in their later lives. And not just the boys, of course – although the boys are certainly our focus here…

Find out more about me – and my partner Dave, our voyage of gay discovery and our interest in acrobatics and fitness. Two other books follow this one covering circus tours, creating a family, and some adventures and misadventures:

The Power of Love: ISBN 978-1-907732-41-6

Against All Odds: ISBN 978-1-908645-35-7

And now: back to the boys and their weights successes – and their selfies!

Others get their mates to take the pictures so you can, as it were, see the whole picture!

And, finally for today, what the ‘weights mates’ are meant to be doing! Notwithstanding that here must be a third guy behind the camera.

Incidentally, if anyone fancies ‘rating’ these pictures, the second one gets our vote, hands down!

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Enthusiasts

Posted on July 6, 2017 by

There’s six enthusiasts pictured in a garage which presumably doubles as a gym. Yesterday I mentioned six potential fitness enthusiasts who had agreed to join our kids (and us!) early morning for our own run/weights/wrestle/swim before breakfast. These are six guys with impressive physiques, all from the same High School and clearly proud of their bodies. Also determined to enjoy themselves at summer camp.

And so they did. All turned up – even before Leo and Chris had emerged from our camping bus into the early-morning sun to meet them (it has turned into thunderstorms now, but we’ll get by with that!). To say the six have ‘clicked’ with our two boys would be an understatement – at one point just before lunch I had to remind the boys that they are being paid to be here to work, and not to leave all the acrobatic coaching to Jaymee and Karla.

In off-duty hours, though, the six-some has definitely become an eight-some, even taking Leo and Chris’s eyes (and minds) off ‘their’ girls for a couple of hours! Much talk about weights routines: some of the lads aspire to be bodybuilding prizewinners and, like most groups, all of them encourage and inspire each other to do better.

Some are more shy and cautious than others…

..but all the shirts quickly came off in the dawn light and, by the time it was lake-swim time, they all got naked along with our two as well, being only slightly phased when Jaymee and Karla joined them!

(OK, that’s a sunset picture and a bigger lake but, as I don’t post pictures of our under-18s here, it will have to do!). A Russian lake, undies, and a bit of acrobatics, since we’re on the subject…

The open-air wrestle tournies are going well – we allow any style including pinning and submission as well as collegiate…

…along with the general fitness stuff…

..and, of course, ‘free time’ means ‘playtime’…

…in fact, anything which keeps them outdoors topping up their Vitamin D without getting burned is fine!

Even when the thundery showers arrive…

…they’re unstoppable! The posing and comparisons just go on all day!

…not least in bathrooms!

Let’s join in:

“Am I ripped?”

Not half!

Contemplating his next move on the bars. OK. Just for once, if you are interested in knowing more about my books covering our gay fitness lifestyle and adventures, take a look at the previous post – or almost ANY post!

Here’s our finale for today – someone else having a thought by the p-bars! Bye for now.

 

 

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Taking Up Where We left Off…

Posted on July 5, 2017 by

…that was a picture theme of ‘Speedos and Briefs’, as we complete our final two weeks living out of a decrepit camping bus in the ‘Great Outdoors’ at summer camp…

…and also recovering from last night’s Independence Day private fakir show! No injuries, except for the self-inflicted ones by Karen and Clare who decided to do their meat-hook tug-of-war stuff “just one more time”… so a few plasters in play today and tee-shirts left on instead of bikini tops. Otherwise, business as normal, teaching fitness and facilitating various outdoor pursuits including lake swimming, calisthenics and ‘folk’ wrestling.

As well as the basic muscle training – mainly bodyweight exercises, although the site has some weights and we have ours.

Actually, I do have an injury… but not from last night. Around lunchtime I volunteered to help with a little ‘bushwhacking’ using a strimmer. Something unidentified flew out of the brush and sank its sting – or its teeth – into my forearm. Didn’t feel anything, but noticed a stream of blood running down to my hand. My forearm has now grown a huge swelling – like another bicep sticking our below the elbow. Doesn’t ache or anything, so I’m letting it take its course. If I don’t show up on this blog any more, you’ll know that was a bad choice!

A few more kids have arrived here today now that the actual Independence Day family stuff  is over with. A group of six lads has also caught the attention of Leo and Chris – six obviously keen muscle builders. An interesting collection from a single High School in NC, apparently: two gentlemen of colour, one Native American (not unlike the ‘hero’ of my forthcoming book Let The Future Find Me, but without the distinctive pony tail hair) and three white. All challenging each other to be bodybuilding stars (if it lasts!). So Leo and Chris have challenged them to join their otherwise private 6am run, weights, wrestle and wild swim – all before the rest of the camp slinks from its beds. I feel that they will turn up, so it will be interesting to see how it works out… especially when our boys leap into the lake naked… no need to dry those Speedos or shorts then, of course!

We have decided to leave USA a couple of days earlier than we originally intended, in order to stop off in UK and let our parents see their grandchildren before crossing over to Portugal. Starting from Oxford, we have decided to fly from Bristol, just for a change, to avoid the hassle of London (and to get cheaper fares!). Leo and Jaymee feign nonchalance about their short trip to our new ‘home’ but, in reality, they are quite excited, envisioning frequent trips over to use the beach (and hopefully with their friends/boy-girl friends paid for too). We shall see!

So, on with the picture theme. Enjoy.

You really like Speedos? OK, then…

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

A ‘Brief’ Interlude

Posted on July 3, 2017 by

Well… briefs and Speedos, so far as the pictures are concerned!

We’re sure looking forward to spending the rest of the summer in southern Europe, with a beach available for our free time!!

This week includes Independence Day here is USA and, as a consequence, there are fewer kids at the summer camp this week so we’re having a ‘brief’ respite although the kids who are here are fun to work with. But on Independence Day itself, we’ve taken on an evening ‘gig’ – acrobatics and fakir show, adults only – at a private party. We also did this last year while at this camp. Just a short distance away – the camping bus with all our equipment should just about make it without collapsing. Fingers crossed for that.

Just been watching the teens rehearsing some of their bits. Jaymee and Leo synchronising their performance on the balance canes. The Chris on his back on the nail bed: Leo stand on his chest then arches backwards into a tight ‘bridge’, hands on Chris’s legs just above the knees. Jaymee steps up on Chris’s face – because its there! – and then goes into handstand on his hips, while Karla goes tight up behind here on his knees. So that’s three additional persons crushing Chris down on the nails… the things we all do for fun! Of course, after the girls cartwheel off and then Leo does a back walkover off before lifting Chris by the hands, he is entirely unharmed except for some rather red indentations in his back. Feeling proud of themselves is part of the fun! Then they’ll be walking on their hands along the broken glass…

Karen and Clare will be doing their usual fire stuff in which we all get involved in various ways. They also decided to do a suspension trick – hooks in their backs with chains between, Dave and I counterbalancing to pull them apart – and then Chris will (briefly) hoist Jaymee up to sit on the chains… The ladies (who will topless for this) have a history of this stuff which, so far as we are concerned, they’re welcome to, although we all get involved with the nails as well as the glass… Dave and I will also do the ‘hanging from teeth’ stuff because there is a beam we can rig our trapeze from. All in all – a normal day in the ‘household’ of the eight of us. Perhaps I should say ‘bus-hold’ in this case, though, but the word probably doesn’t exist.

The ladies’ more extreme stuff with hooks has not been rehearsed – partly because it is not something to do too often anyway, partly because we wouldn’t show that one in front of the camping kids anyway and thirdly because they’ve done hooks so many times in the past they know what they will have to put up with.

As ever, they are rather laid back about it.

So that’s our ‘brief interlude’ for tomorrow night: here now is the rest of yours… starting with a dude with a great tan…

Now, a brief interlude in your ‘briefs’ interlude. Something you might care to click on to discover more of our former (younger!) life and times in my first book:

Loving the Boy: ISBN 978-1-907732-30-0

The story continued…

The Power of Love: ISBN 978-1-907732-41-6

That is an absolutely excellent picture: the boy, the blue water contrasting with the trunks, the swirls of water captured by a short exposure… class!

And the end of the adventure:

Against All Odds: ISBN 978-1-908645-35-7

Turning things on their head…

To finish for today, a beautifully lit study of a muscular back. There’s plenty more Speedo and briefs pictures waiting to be posted, so maybe we’ll do this theme again very soon.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Day of Reckoning

Posted on July 2, 2017 by

When you achieve something after a lot of effort, or after worrying about it for some time – like this guy with his neck hang from the bar – there is great satisfaction and (sometimes) relief). Yesterday, we passed such a milestone – or at least I think we did. Not so much in our lives, though, but those of the kids.

Let me explain. This is Independence Day weekend. We’re still at summer camp with two weeks to go. Our offspring and their mothers are here – Ethan left now to spend Independence Day with his family. Leon and Dane are also home now. Two mums, two dads, two kids and their two friends who are, as it happens, not just professional partners in acrobatics and stuff, but also two aspiring ‘couples’: Dave’s daughter Jaymee with Chris, who is my son Leo’s best friend, and Leo with Jaymee’s friend Karla. all are around 15½ years old, past puberty, and the juices are started to flow.

One could suggest, I suppose, that they need to ‘chill’!

But no, This is 2017. Kids mature young these days and they are starting to flex their social muscles as well as their actual ones. Starting to think about their own ‘Independence Day’.

Dave and I already overheard Leo and Chris – sharing a tent with two older teen wrestle boys a couple of weeks back – sharing also some lessons in jerking off (not to beat about the bush, as it were, but just to beat…). Two days ago, Karen (Jaymee’s mum) overheard Jaymee and Karla joshing with each other about they would like the boys to do to them. So we (adults) decided that the time had come for some serious talking.

Leon and Dane had a car here so, before they left, we asked them to go down to the nearest drugstore and lay in a supply of condoms. I hope that his doesn’t sound irresponsible, but w have to be realists. Then, while the ladies spoke with the girls, we spoke with the boys. In loco parentis as far as Chris was concerned, but I called his dad Steve first to OK it.

You have to remember though that we do have four very responsible kids here in many ways. They train together and the stuff they do is really tough. Often it is done naked or near naked because Jaymee and Leo grew up together like that and in the ‘family’ it has just been kind of normal. And they have two ‘safe places’ to do that – our private training cabin and the private gym. And, when they are training, the relationships are totally ‘professional’, which greatly impresses us. But then come the ‘letting hair down’ moments…

So our messages were pretty blunt. Absolutely do not come on to your girl (or any girl) unless you are 100% certain that they agree and consent… otherwise it is rape. Absolutely do not proceed without a condom – otherwise you could be a father at 15 and potentially ruin a girl’s life. Absolutely do not rely on a girl saying ‘it’s OK, I’m on the pill…’ Understand the menstrual cycle… Understand about sexually transmitted diseases…  I could go on, but you get the idea. An ordeal I imagine every parent goes through…

This came in the very early morning after they had been for a run with the girls and done some weights. Then we (adults) had waded in and separated them. Dave and I handed the box of condoms over to the boys and asked if they understood what they had to do. ‘Next time you get hard, try it…’

Chris and Leo were pretty stunned at first. We felt über-embarrassed, hardly believing what we were saying to my “little boy” and his friend. ‘Any questions?’ Leo and Chris looked at each other. ‘Um, what about oral…?’ Good grief. But they are not stupid. Leo and Jaymee have gay/lesbian parents. So a good question. We discussed it.

Still embarrassed all round – a long silence followed. Then Leo stood up and just gave me a big hug, his warm and sweaty chest (from his training exertions) pressed against mine. No words, but I knew what he was trying to say. A combination of ‘thanks’ and ‘trust us’.

I think we can.

Then Leo put his arm around Chris’s shoulders and said ‘Let’s swim’. They strode into the lake, and their girls shortly followed.

Whew. So glad that’s over. Writing about it here is kind of cathartic. I like to think that the kids respect us – we respect them.

But enough. The rest of this post returns to the usual theme of fit male bodies. Enjoy.

Starting with two which we might caption “intense and proud”…

And now, professionally posed but rather excellent…

Speaking of ‘professionally’, there are three books which would help to explain how we got to find ourselves in the situation I described at the top of this post! Some have suggested that they are quite a good read, especially for the gay-friendly reader…

…but, now, ‘on with the show’:

One clearly sweaty wrestler, whereas his friend seems to be holding a beer bottle… ??

Talking of beer bottles – and toadstools (?) – and a bit of fun on the side…

Ah, the sea! The beach! Yes! Two weeks to go…

 

 

 

 

 

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Odds and Ends (Mainly Ends!)

Posted on June 29, 2017 by

Something of a mash-up, this post, as I find odd bits of time to try and put something together and then find WiFi to send it from ‘the backwoods’! Our work with the summer-camp kids continues: some successes in terms of inspiring fitness, some failures. But being outdoors most of the time is cool.

Heartily sick of the camping bus, though better than a tent I suppose…

… despite the agreeable company of Dave, three other gay lads from our ‘partnership’ plus family (kids, friends and their mums…) in an assortment of bunks. And Leon continues to thrust his head into various compartments of the bus and then emerges shaking his head at the state of decay… I feel certain that this could be the last-ever trip in this vehicle!

Another interesting discussion is in progress. If you recall mention of a blossoming gay relationship between under-age Jude (Canadian lad, bodybuilder) and a guy he met on the internet initially called Korben (two years older, also bodybuilder), it seems that their relationship is blossoming and has the cautious support of Jude’s parents (he’s 17). Korben is travelling over from Knoxville twice to day: once to train with Jude and the other lads in the early morning before school (when it is in session), and then in the evening at the private gym where all the tyro bodybuilders sweat it out.

Occasionally he gets to stay over in Jude’s house occasionally, Jude goes over to Knoxville…

I’m sure that a lot of comparisons of physique development go on in the bathrooms…

…and, no doubt, in the bedrooms too. It is hard to be critical when Dave and I discovered each other at 17…

…especially as went ‘the whole gay way’ very quickly after that. Anyway, the debate is whether they could (should?) take over the room that Dave and I will finally vacate, with Korben then only making one return drive to Knoxville every day (for work – he is a salesman in his father’s car dealership) and giving up his rented apartment there. Karen and Clare (house owners) and our mates Pete (Dave’s brother) and Ivo – another gay couple and permanenet residents) will have a say, obviously. Our kids Jaymee and Leo already have straight friends staying over regularly and there are two hetero relationships blossoming as a result… something of a hive of activity!! Of course, a big attraction would be the training shed “on site”, which Dave and I would certainly miss were it not for being responsible for two gyms in our new employment in Portugal. Nah – we’ll miss it anyway, sharing those 6am starts with the enthusiastic teens!

…although, back in Portugal, we’ll have a beach to play on (and plenty of time to play on it with some great local lads)!

…especially in the evenings…

Change! We all have to learn to accommodate change, I guess. Let’s have some more inspirational pictures now.

In regard to making comparisons, perhaps we should not comment that the guy on the right in the next one seems to have an extraordinarily long neck! And also, perhaps, that their gym seems to have a bar in it!

On balance, as we might well say…

…I think that we prefer a different kind of bar…

…at least so far as this blog is concerned! Although my books make it clear that we certainly a beer from time to time…

Loving the Boy: ISBN 978-1-907732-30-0

The Power of Love: ISBN 978-1-907732-41-6

Against All Odds: ISBN 978-1-908645-35-7

Yes, we have a roof terrace at our place in Portugal – but it does have a wall around it to prevent us from falling off! And, as previously noted, we have a beach to train on as well…

OK. Four more gym-bunny bodies, and it’s “over and out” for this one.

 

 

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Changeover Time

Posted on June 26, 2017 by

Summer camp half over for us, and some changes at the weekend. The two teen lads who have been teaching wrestling (and teaching Leo and Chris some wayward stuff in their tent!) have left us and, for this week only, their place is taken by our close friends (close in the Tuan Jie sense) Leon and Dane, giving up a week of their vacation time to enjoy the ‘fun’. They are wrestle fanatics up in KY, and have also learned some of our acrobatic and fakir stuff in the past, so we’re all highly delighted. Zach has had to return to Oak Ridge to massage his expanding clientele at the beauty center (featured as ‘Maisie’s’ in my books, but that was a disguise) but Ethan is staying on as his partner Jack is tied up in Toronto with family stuff. And with this new line-up, plus the girls and the four kids, the fitness training, acrobatic teaching and occasional shows goes on!

Those are superb handbalances from a top-flight acrobatic gymnastics club in a cabaret performance.

Sometimes, just sitting in the shade and enjoying the environment is very satisfying too!

I referred in some recent posts to our last-remaining camping bus (we had two in the old days) having seen better days. Leon’s day job is managing the maintenance of a bus fleet, so it didn’t take long before he had his head in the engine compartment and pointed out that diesel was spewing out all over the engine from one of the injectors, and presenting a major fire hazard. Then he noticed that the radiator was supported only by its hoses. He fixed the first problem but the second needs welding, so eventually will need a slow and cautious drive home. And while he was contemplating all of this, plus a knocking noise from the transmission, a delivery trucked backed into the side of the bus while he still had his head over the engine. Omens of imminent scrappage, we feel. Apart from Jack and Ethan, there is little appetite for touring and living out of kitbags these days – after all, we’ve been doing it on and off for over 15 years and the interior of the bus is looking pretty crappy as well – and with Dave and I scooting off to Portugal… After all, the transit company withdrew the bus from public service through high mileage in 2002, and it has been across the country a few times since then!

Now some more fitness images for you, starting with six bar boys:

I don’t think that they would get away with  underwear here – Speedos yes. However, it seems to be all the rage in eastern Europe these days (and Russia) – in public and certainly in the weights gym:

I guess it is cheaper than buying shorts.

Here is a fit group about to race for the pool:

…and they’ve all been able to afford shorts! As, of course, have these gymnast boys:

Here in the ‘great outdoors’, it has been pretty hot…

…although no-one has been wishing for snow…

Even with a lot of cloud and even occasional rain, the humidity has stayed high and every activity generates some sweat…

In some sense, our job is to keep these boys (and girls) sweating from dawn to dusk, and to improve their fitness. most of them ‘want it’, thank goodness: in another summer camp, last year, the opposite was the case and it was awful. Awful for us, anyway. Made you want to just curl up and cry…

Hope I can get away with that one…

Five more boys whose efforts in fitness have certainly paid off:

One to go then but, before I go, a quick reminder of how you can support the blog. Don’t just lend a book to your mates – buy them one for themselves!

 

 

 

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Solstice Story

Posted on June 25, 2017 by

‘Midsummer’ – allegedly. In solstice terms, yes: in practical terms, there’s a long way to go yet with the good weather! We hope. Even for the UK:

A nice story from some readers of my books in the UK. “We are in the Lake District and, inspired by the picture you posted of Bassenthwaite, decided to check out your locations to see if they were ‘real’! Well, wow! We found your magic circle of oak trees and, despite the path to them being marred by excavations for a water main…” (Oh dear!) “… the atmosphere there was so peaceful – just amazing on an otherwise busy and extremely hot Tuesday afternoon. We didn’t connect with your mysterious helpers, but we can confirm the extraordinary feeling of wellbeing. Next morning was the summer solstice, which we celebrated at sunrise in the stone circle a few miles away called Castleriggs – another magical place with views of the Lakeland mountains in every direction from a small grassy summit. Watching sunrise over the eastern fells was spiritual – some singing of Celtic songs, someone left a poem at the centre of the circle under a stone, others laid flowers, and someone rather strangely left oranges. A gift for the Gods, maybe! Thanks so much Tone for bringing some of this magic to your writings – as well as your eccentric lifestyle…”

Well, thanks for that. Lovely to get such a message out of the blue. The message went on in a much more personal way, but I’ve quoted enough. Now perhaps folks will understand why I put a picture of that Bassenthwaite locale on the back cover of book 3…

And so to our usual theme of male fitness promotion. Hopefully you will enjoy today’s selection.

Here are five guys who are seriously pleased with their bodies as a result of hard training:

…and two wrestlers, so pleased that they are pictured twice!

For these two fine specimens, it looks as though the one on the right couldn’t give a damn!

And, with a quick mention of the other two books (full details by clicking on the covers), on we go…

This next gym has a very odd environment. There seems to be a guy about to use the parallel bars – but there is no height above them to speak of? If it were not for the shirtless guy in the foreground who seems to have been training, I would have decided that this was not a gym but an equipment showroom. What do you think?

One thing I can say – its in Russia. And now: into the bushes at night!

Remove the tats and this would be a cool picture…

…and, while we all ‘hang in there’…

…and, while we commend the back lever here, we do urge a careful check on the fixings of basketball hoops first…

But those street workout guys sure build great bodies…

When the workout’s over, time to crash in the locker room!

…but showing off for the camera, of course!

And, finally for today, a nod to ‘international handstand day’ which was also on solstice day.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment