My ex visited last weekend.

They came down from Boston, my ex and a friend who came along for the ride to visit the city. They drove down on Friday and camped out at my deserted apartment, the apartment with the yellow and orange flowery wallpaper on the bathroom ceiling that makes you feel like you've been doing way too much speed. Or LSD. Or both. They had a copy of the keys from a previous trip.

They did their Manhattan tourist thing for a couple days; I went about my weekend business.

We had a nice dinner Sunday night, just my ex and I. We tried the new restaurant, March, on 58th and 1st, ignoring the pretentious maitre d' and savouring the chef's gustatory delights. We ordered eight small dishes and three desserts. Everything was delectable. Everything but the grilled yellowtail, if you asked me.

We hadn't seen each other for a couple years, my ex and I. We had been together for about four, maybe five years, depending on who you asked. We were very close. We even talked marriage, that's how close. We parted amicably, my ex and I, four or five years ago, and kept in touch. A lot. Talked daily sometimes. Lots of e-mail. But we hadn't seen each other in a couple years.

How's the food?

Delicious.

Strange how life can change at a moment's notice. Strange how things can turn out oh so differently from what you thought just a few years ago.

Strange.

My ex and I spent four hours over dinner. We talked. We laughed. We had a great time.

My ex and I parted at eleven-thirty.

Oh, and happy birthday in a few minutes.

Kiss. On the cheek.

I put my ex in a cab and gave the driver instructions how to get to my apartment in Queens. You can't be too careful in the city these days with your guests.

Especially the girls.

Yes, my ex is a girl.

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Happy 30th to me.

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There is a brotherhood among motorcyclists that, unless you are a rider yourself, you are not privy to. And as with all secret societies, there is a sign for this club. Whenever you pass another rider on the oncoming lane, you're supposed to extend your left hand out at forty-five degrees to your lower body in a half-wave, a salutation of sorts, that yes, you too are part of the motorcycle brotherhood.

We gave a lot of waves today as we rode up to Aidan and Stacy's Memorial Day barbeque party in Westchester. The beautiful weather and baby blue skies beckoned to bikers everywhere, and riders were out in massive numbers, weaving the invitingly curvy and tree-lined roads to Westchester as the last vestiges of winter dust scattered in their wakes.

The collector at the bridge tollbooth, a strikingly handsome young black man with the top three buttons of his snug-fitting shirt undone asked me if we were heading to the biker rally. I asked him where it was. "Myrtle Beach," he said. I smiled and told him no, that I didn't even know there was a biker rally this weekend. "Yes, too bad I had to work on such a nice day like today or I'd be there." He laughed. "Well, have a nice ride."

After the barbecue, we rode up quickly to Bear Mountain to catch the sunset, waving to more bikers along the way. And as the evening chill set in, we headed back to the city, heated handgrips set on high to generate as much warmth as we possibly could. We rode past the piers on the West Side Highway to look at the ships visiting New York for Fleet Week, admiring the majestic vessels all decked with lights and flags and looking so very important. We got home a few minutes ago, all tired out and ready for bed.

We did a decent amount of riding today, and we got a lot of waving done. Now when you see motorcyclists passing each other and sticking their hands out at each other, you too will know. You too will know about this secret brotherhood.

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Just came back from Attack of the Clones. My department bought 45 tickets to the 7pm showing at the impressive Ziegfeld Theater, and after finger food and drinks at one of the local watering holes, we all headed over to see what all the noise was about this movie.

Well, it was entertaining. But with all the brilliant digital artistry and special effects, poor George Lucas still couldn't get the actors to have any chemistry with themselves or the audience (well, unless you think a theaterload of collective laughter and groaning is chemistry). And with the flat dialogue and at times overly dramatic sequences, I wonder if he deliberately directed it that way to keep in line with (the now terribly dated) Episodes IV, V and VI. Wait a minute, did I just say poor George Lucas? Damn, I never thought I'd ever hear anyone say that, much less me.

Well, we waited a week after opening night for this movie. It wasn't like last year with Episode I. Remember how tough it was to get tickets for opening night for Episode I? Well, my entire firm went to see it on opening night. Our CEO directed everyone to keep hitting the redial button all day, ordering as many tickets as we could. We sent our interns to line up at the theaters for tickets. We did everything. And by showtime, we had about a hundred extra tickets left over. That was crazy, seeing as some people were selling opening night tickets for hundreds of dollars on Ebay. Crazy, I tell you, crazy...

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Exactly one week from today I turn 30. Seven days before I can say "Yeah, my twenties were good." One week, y'all hear? Is there anything I must do to prepare for this? One week...

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Despite the forecasted Saturday morning rains, we drove up to southern Vermont after work on Friday to spend the night at Tom and Nancy's cabin. We had planned to do a bit of hiking--perhaps Mount Monadnock--in the afternoon after the rains, and had packed shorts and tee shirts. Just in case.

Instead, Greg and I woke up Saturday morning to my nephew Chris' exclamation. "Holy guacamole!" We opened our eyes and stared in disbelief at the skylight and windows. Could we believe what we were seeing? Snow? Snow in the middle of May? Yes, it was snowing! Fat, happy flakes of winter swirled around the tiny cabin, coating the ground and trees with an inch of winter white.

My youngest nephew Jeffrey giggled. "Ha! I've been awake for about an hour now, waiting to hear Chris say, 'Holy guacamole.' I just knew he would say it!"

We lay in our bunks, staring through the windows at the seasonal improbability. "Can you believe that?" said Greg. "I knew we shouldn't have been singing Christmas carols on the drive up here last night." We laughed. "Oh well, I guess hiking's out today. On to Plan B."

After a lazy brunch with Nancy at the local Putney diner, the four of us drove the hour-long trip to Dartmouth, where Greg took us on a campus tour. "Here's where I stayed freshman year, there's where I took Physics, and over there was where we sledded in winter," he said, pointing in a million directions.

We meandered about campus for a while more before heading back to Putney, and after a pleasant evening of lazing around the house, we headed back to New York.

In strong contrast to yesterday's surprise snowfall, we woke up this morning to picture-perfect blue skies. We took Chris, Jeffrey and my mom upstate to Bear Mountain, where we had a wonderful brunch at the Bear Mountain Inn. It was terribly relaxing, and we wandered about the well-maintained lawns, marvelling at the splendid weather. We sat lakeside for a while and then headed to the merry-go-round where we watched the scores of kids laughing in glee as they went round and round.

What a relaxing weekend.

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For lunch today, my group and I strolled down to our favourite street vendor on 53rd Street, where we each ordered a lunch box special containing curried chicken, rice and a small salad. "Jada jada chicken dena," we said, in unison. The two men in the cart grinned at us and nodded. They've come to know us because we go there so often. The food is cheap, fast and tasty, and they always give us extra chicken when we ask in Hindi. "Yes, jada jada," the younger man said. And he laughed.

It reminds me of when I was a young boy, growing up in Trinidad. There was a man named Monkey who sold black pudding out of two or three white buckets in the middle of town. His black pudding was reputed to be the best, and by my account, yes, it was pretty much the best damn black pudding I had ever tasted. Monkey wasn't his name, really, but no one around me knew him as anything but that, and I was convinced that he himself had forgotten his real name. "People call me Monkey," he'd say.

Monkey's business thrived as word of his black pudding spread, and he always had a line of people queuing up to sample his wares. He had a soft spot for the kids, and was always laughing and joking every time I saw him, often giving us a tiny taste of the black pudding when we called out to him. "Monkey, Monkey, me, me, me," we'd yell, excited kids in the middle of the taxi stand. And he'd cut us a piece of his pudding.

It seemed that as time went by, Monkey's success with his black pudding was surpassed only by his popularity with the kids, and he gave us increasingly larger pieces as we shouted with delight. And we loved Monkey. Monkey was great with the kids. Monkey knew how to work the crowds.

This one particular time I remember seeing Monkey, I was about eight years old. My brother and I were traveling home from school in the middle of a swelteringly hot afternoon and he was there at the taxi stand, wiping his brow with a white handkerchief as he gave his daily performance. As our taxi rolled up to him, my brother yelled "Monkey" and stretched his palm out the window. Monkey didn't miss a beat, and plopped a huge piece of pudding smack into his hand, grinning at us as the taxi pulled away. My brother pulled his hand back into the car and we surveyed our spoils. Yes, Monkey's gifts were definitely getting larger and larger. We spent the next few minutes munching happily and savouring the wonderful blend of spices in Monkey's preparation as the taxi sped along on its way.

I can't really remember seeing Monkey anytime after that. Perhaps he had moved to a different part of town where he could set up a larger business. Perhaps his business could no longer support such a demanding clientele whose only payments were cheeky grins and outstretched hands. Whatever the reason, we never saw him again. Monkey and his free samples had mysteriously disappeared.

I had forgotten about Monkey until today, some twenty or so odd years later, as I waited in line for my lunch. It was the same cheeky grin that my colleagues and I all had as we asked for extra chicken. "Jada jada chicken," we repeated, laughing. And when we got back to the office and opened our boxes, we found out that once more, there was no reason to be disappointed.

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I never thought that I would come out to my mother. Ever. I thought I would have to stay in the closet around her, gently smiling and shrugging off her comments and questions as to when I'd get married. "Yes, Mom, I know I'm not getting younger. Yes, I know Peter has been married for a few years now. Yes, I know. But aren't these flowers lovely? And isn't it time for dinner? Perhaps you're hungry?" I always thought it would be too painful for her to understand, too difficult for her to grasp. Generation gap. Cultural gap. Language barrier. I thought I'd have to forever keep her in the dark about who I really was.

I came out to her last year.

And it wasn't easy coming out to her at all. I sat her down for three long hours one Sunday, holding her hand and explaining to her as gently as I possibly could that I was gay. She shook her head, tears rolling down her face as she tried to maintain composure, at times failing as her resolve weakened. But she understood. She asked me about Greg, and I said, yes, he was who she thought he was. But the important thing was she understood. I hugged her many times. She hugged me back. She cried. I held her. But she understood.

Today, we took her on a trip upstate to Bear Mountain. My three nephews and my eldest nephew's wife took one car; Greg, my mom and I took the other. It was cold. It was rainy. And we couldn't get reservations last week for brunch today at the Bear Mountain Inn. But we had an absolutely wonderful time. My mom laughed at Greg's jokes. She asked him questions. She told him about Trinidad, about Hong Kong. She loved it when Greg and I sang together along with the radio.

She's come a long way since that Sunday, my mom. She's come a long way in accepting me, a long way in embracing Greg as part of the family. I'm so proud of her. Happy Mother's Day, Mom. I love you so.

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I called in a sick day from work today. I got pulled into a last minute two-hour meeting yesterday and missed my doctor's appointment, so I went to see a stand-in physician today to see about my aches and pains.

"I'm going to have to take a throat culture, of course."

I hate throat cultures. That's when they take a long cotton swab and shove it into the back of your throat, invariably inducing the gag reflex that's so uncomfortably uncomfortable.

"I'm going to give you some Cipro, okay?" she said, after she had convinced herself that I could gag no more.

"Cipro? Ciprofloxacin? Isn't that what you treat anthrax with?"

"Yep."

So now I'm taking an antibiotic so strong that it's like swatting the proverbial fly with a sledgehammer. Hopefully it means that at least I'll be feeling better soon.

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We spent the weekend in southern Vermont with Greg's cousin Tom and his wife, Nancy. It was a nice trip, despite arriving after 3am Saturday morning. Tom is building a house there and hopes to have things finished either this year or the next, and his being in the housebuilding business will speed things up a bit. It's a wonderful spot they have. Right now, there's a tiny cabin that's perched above a much-widened spring-fed pond, and the site for their house is a few meters off the pond. We stocked the pond with a few minnows on Saturday, and the tiny fish seemed to be happy with their new accommodations, and they schooled near the tulips that Nancy planted along the water's edge.

Late on Saturday we drove down to the General Store to pick up a few steaks. We then drove the few lazy miles to the cabin and the pond, where we grilled the steaks over a charcoal pit while listening to the crickets and tiny tree frogs chirping under a ever-deepening blue evening sky. As the night drew near, we built a bonfire and huddled for warmth, watching the stars as they began to peek out. It's amazing how you can miss so much a night sky full of stars.

The only drawback is that I think I caught the flu somewhere late last week, and now I'm aching all over. My nose is runny, and I am heading to see the doctor this afternoon. Hopefully he'll prescribe some of those magical pills that'll make me feel better in no time. Hope everyone's weekend was enjoyable, too.

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Dinner and sophisticated drinks last night at the oh-so-trendy Tao left my colleagues and me absolutely stuffed to the brim. Alas, we ordered way too much food, and it was quite painful to watch the delicate creations being carted off half-eaten. I took the guys in my group out for dinner last night, for something between morale-boosting group-bonding and a night out with the guys. At 10pm, we left the restaurant and threw civilized demeanour to the wind as we headed off to do a bit of Thursday-night bar-hopping, eventually ending up at a karaoke bar belting our favourite songs in typical drunken fashion. What is it about going to bed after 4am that seems so reasonable when you're drunk?

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