I've done it in bars, in public toilets, on the train going home and even in the Queen's garden.
I didn't come out till I was approaching my 40s and I emerged onto what was a terrific and vibrant gay scene in London. I'm talking the early 2000s when I had a lot of time to make up for.
There was a whole range of bars then going to from the glass and chrome palaces to the sleazy joints where the carpet stuck to your feet.
There was also a huge sauna scene which at its peak number 14 different establishments.
I had a whale of a time, but I was very glad of the safety culture that had been created in the wake of Aids. I genuinely given thanks that I was very luck to have missed that risk.
In the intervening years it's all been terribly downhill.
Can you believe that London is down to less than seven saunas? And in the West End there was a choice of about 17 bars. That's gone down to about 8.
First, Gaydar was the big spoiler. Then came all the apps and people no longer had to go bars if they want to hook up with someone and that an awful lot of the buzz out of the scene. Saunas especially lost their horniness as straight or attached people were no longer there eager to get their rocks off.
The other real assault on the gay scene then was Westminster City Council which too monitoring the bars and clamping down on lewd behaviour and all that. Said it was damaging the tourist industry. Fkkk that. Half the people were tourists.
I'm not entirely sure who makes themselves the great finger wagger in the sky, but there a sense that as gay rights have been asserted and discrimination clamped down on, that somehow, we're expected to clean up our act and sanitise our naughty ways. 'You're the same as us now. So, no more sex in bars and bushes on the heath!' I've heard people say.
Go to the hell, I think.
In previous comments I've read all about date rate drugs this and unsafe that and I do respect those points of view, but this talk of 'desexualisation' is just another form of repression, it seems to me.
As for the safety aspect, Serial killers Dennis Nielsen and Colin Ireland preyed on the gay bars, but in much more recent times Stephen Port and Reynhard Sinaga did not.
Killers like that will always be around.
The bars that I knew of old were very responsible environments. Bar staff had keen eyes and they had a strong sense of looking out for their clientele and the culture was the same amongst the regulars.
I personally wish more bars would seek private members club status then, for one thing, we wouldn't have to put up with Friday/Saturday harridans dancing around their handbags.
Finally, speaking for myself, I'm only interested in exclusively gay bars. That's where the fun was and I wish we could get it back.