Yes indeed, on a magical mystery trip with lucy in the sky with diamonds and the tabloids in the wings shouting 'jump you bastard, jump'. A journey from which more than a few individuals never returned as such, but who knows how pleasure-endowed was that which they left behind?

My intricate network of underworld contacts had failed to inform me of the celebrations of the first synthesising of lysergic acid by the chemist Albert Hoffman. It doubled up as a Legalise LSD campaign which no doubt will have the policy-makers scribbling away frantically in the Commons, seeking out the swiftest diplomatic route by which to comply with this most reasonable of demands.

It coincided rather neatly with the London Marathon, another fact of which I was ill-informed. Naturally, had I known, I would rather have watched a lot of reddish purple sweat-covered people gratuitously inflicting pain on themselves in flagrant defiance of the Law Lords recently ruling on the voluntary experience of pain. I trust these perverts were taken straight off to Resyke.

However, there was a meeting between the worlds of sado-masochistic sports caper and mind-expanding drug-taking activities. Namely an acid bicycle race. I understand the nature of the bikes' outwards condition admirably reflected the inner condition of their riders. They took off on a few laps of the Park, some cycling, some hovering slightly above the ground, some waving about in the marmalade sky on their modified cycling operatus, some just freewheeling along the coloured vapour haze or admiring the subtle variety of shades of wind playing about the park that fine day.

And there was no trouble except from the mandatory representatives of your local god-squad pointing out, as is their wont, that if something bestows more than a modicum of pleasure upon its recipients it is EVIL AND A WORK OF THE DEVIL. They didn't get too rowdy and anyway must have provided endless comedic value for the trippers. Weirding out someone whose brain is so confined and lacking in imagination as to go for the old salvation con must be a sport fit for queens.

But I wasn't there. I'll go back for the 60th, age thirty-nine, making damn sure I don't wear a single fucking flower in my hair. Oh, and acting purely as a reporter, I assure you.

BOOTS THE BEAGLEBASHERS

There was I and a fellow initiate into the delights of the Fortnum ... Masons foot-hall, just leaving its hallowed premises armed with a few small necessities, and what do we see just up the road but a total police blockade surrounding a group of rather scruffy people waving placards and shouting "Murderers! Murderers!" at Boots the Chemist.

Approaching a friendly policeman, I asked him what they were protesting about. "It's the Anti-Vivisection Society, the Anti-Nazi League and the Animal Liberation Front. They're protesting over animal experiments."

*Do you get a lot of this sort of thing?" I asked him.

"This time of year it gets worse, but there's rarely any trouble. They'll be gone soon." He didn't seem particularly put out or bothered by it all. No-one was physically attacking anyone and no serious damage was done to the shop. The police were remarkably calm, amused almost.

Half an hour later that part of the street had been opened again and business was continuing as usual.

Briefly I felt a little rush of pleasure. It's always fun to watch other people's days being messed up by protesters to start with, but it was all so pleasant. The protesters were rightly granted their right to protest, the police sensibly screened them off from the public with barriers and it was almost like a primitive tribal ceremony. And then they all went home for tea.

PIERCE AND LOVE

Last week, a long-desired appointment with body piercing supremo Mr. Sebastian came up. With my emotions already contorted into a series of improbable and frequently lashing shapes for reasons even I would rather not go into, I then added the trauma/ecstasy of getting pierced with my lover to the intriguing chemical cocktail coursing round my brain and CNS.

He was very brave, watching with curiosity as Mr. Sebastian's dextrous fingers forced the unnervingly wide, hollow piercing needle through the tender flesh of his right nipple. He also went first, so I couldn't be a big sissy when it came to my turn.

My turn involved assuming a position more readily associated with a visit to the gynaecologist and shrieking as the needle found its way through my clitoris hood. It fucking hurt. But not that much. My eyes glued on my lover's, something in me was confirming my readiness to accept all life's diversity with him, the reality of pain as well as the reality of pleasure: acceptance of the whole arena of experience, mental, emotional, physical.

By early evening it was impossible for either party to determine whether the dull ache and occasional hot shot of needle pain was entirely displeasurable. The wrenching-deep emotional meaning of the act, the beauty of the adornments plus the knowledge of the enhanced pleasure which is to come both psychologically and physiologically from the piercings kept us suspended in an arena of feeling which denied categorisation into pleasure or pain but recognised only sensation, intent, meaning, passion.

There ought to be a law against it. There probably is.