I've spent the weekend at a stag party. It was an enjoyable time (firstly at Newmarket watching the racing and latterly in Great Yarmouth).

Although this is not the first such event that I have attended, it's probably the first that I think most closely fitted to the stereotype: attempts to get a large group of men drunk and in a lap-dancing club.

What I was most surprised about, however was how much I enjoyed myself. You see, as I gay man, I have always thought that these events as places for heterosexual men only and, in truth, somewhat intimidating.

Even the lap-dancing club was remarkably asexual and thus, if sexuality is the cause for the friction, it was not important. I wasn't sure what to expect from the site of women cavorting around a pole but sexual was not at the top of my mind (which might be expected) but it was also not at the top of most of the guys I was there with. It was a very odd atmosphere and something I am not, currently, able to sum up in words.

The groom seemed to enjoy himself - although I think he found the lap-dancing club the most awkward as he didn't want to be there. I met lots of interesting new people and the whole thing was not so much an ordeal as a pleasant weekend away.

For that, I am relieved.