Well, the boredom at work may have evaporated, but not the chaos. I've been busy writing code to read complex data files into a very complex database structure. The only problem is that I don't have any real data to work with, and I don't have acc the database. Which means I've had to create mock-ups of both, making the whole exercise a bit like building a dolls house because you don't have the materials to build a real one.

I came out of work one day this week to find crowds of demonstrators and police, in response to the immiment visit of GW to the Sheraton next door, where New York Republicans paid $10,000 for the privilege of eating stale quiche with the President.

Meanwhile, the weather went straight from winter to mid-Summer in two days. Last weekend was cold and wet, Monday was warm and pleasant, and the rest of the week has been in the 90s with thick humidity. On the first day of warm weather I noted tha as 88 degrees at 10.30 in the evening. I actually don't mind it at all. It's a short walk from my air-conditioned apartment to my air-conditioned office. And when I'm off duty, it's rather pleasant, after living in a cold city like San Francisco for g, to amble around in shorts and a t-shirt.

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Rainy day on 8th Ave, Chelsea

There are times - many of them - when I think to myself, gee, this is such a great experience. Loving the warm evenings, sauntering along the busy sidewalks with its fascinating mix of humanity, my arms swinging slowly, reminded constantly of simi edentary, companionable evenings when I used to live in Philadelphia

Other times, sitting in my chilly air-conditioned apartment after a dry, friendless day of work, I feel just a little bleak. On the whole, though, the former type of day outnumbers the latter. Indeed I can have both types of experience within a few hours of each other.

I attended a ceremony at the Customs House down at the tip of Manhattan, with my friend Mitch. The ceremony was to honor the donation of recent paintings to the Coast Guard but I think it was principally an excuse for nice lady painters to mingle with masculine men in uniform. Here Mitch poses next to the painter of one of the paintings I particularly liked.

I've been working out regularly at the Golds Gym just a couple of blocks away. I've yet to make any kind of friendly contact with anybody there. It's quite a contrast to my experience at Golds in the Castro, back home in San Francisco, where worki is becoming a moderately social experience for me. People here just don't seem to make eye contact. Perhaps it's because, unlike my gym at home, this is not ostensibly a "gay" gym. So people aren't sure who's gay, who's straight. Yet peopl eem to be aware of each other. As you walk through the weights room, someone's gaze will sweep the room, and you'll subliminally register that they're aware of you. But the gaze doesn't stop sweeping until it lights upon some unoccupied space where i safe to rest.

Yesterday, I noticed a man in the far corner who reminded me strongly of G, who used to be one of my closest friends when I lived in Philly. I'd met him not long after coming out of the closet, and, in a way, he'd been my mentor to the gay experience. I was shockingly impressed with him when I first met him: strong, self-confident, intellectual and "alternative" in a Midwestern kind of way - but also remote and self-contained; like a muscular John Malkovich. Our friendship had disintegrated over many years, largely because I couldn't shift the feelings of inferiority I'd helplessly feel whenever I was around him.

As I continued to look at this guy in the corner of the gym, I realized, even from 60 feet away, that it was indeed G. I'd recognize his jutting chin anywhere. I hadn't seen him in probably eight years or so, and, really, he didn't look much different. A bit thinner, a bit older. I hesitated and hummed and hawed about whether or not to go over and say hello. I didn't really want to rekindle our friendship, but I felt that the extent of our former relationship required I at least make contact. In the end I plotted a down-the middle strategy of walking past the machine he was working on to let him take the initiative, should he want to. But I don't think he noticed me. No doubt I'll see him there again.