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I went to the Clothes Show Live at Birmingham NEC a few years ago with Pete, and vowed to return every year. Our escapades have, to this day, remained as a "classic" story told far too frequently . Unfortunately I missed last year. This year my partner in crime was Chesson, and the boy didn't let me down! Having a couple of days holiday to use up at work I decided to take Friday off and head up to the NEC. The drive up was a bit of a mission, the highlight was seeing 2 blokes in a van trying to catch up with the girls in the car in front and making all kinds of gestures to us. They were obviously implying that they were "sorts", but some of their sign language was alien to me and Dave. We got there at about 4 and proceeded to blag our entry, which was achieved relatively painlessly. After the car journey I didn't really feel much like skating and was ready for an afternoon of dossing around. For those of you who've never been to Clothes Show or seen it on TV (which is probably most people) here's the deal: It's a f**king massive hall full of models, freaks and other good stuff to look at/laugh at, add to this the bonus of their being a ramp their to skate and you've got an entertaining day on your hands.
Chesson wasted no-time in getting on the ramp, so I thought I may as well join him. The ramp was part of the Sewerside Clothing stand, it's about 12ft wide and 4.5ft tall with an extension on one side. It was a lot better to skate than it looked like it would be, if you know what I mean. So that was it, we ended up skating solidly until the show closed at about 6.30, by which time I was well and truly knackered and smelt quite a bit (fat and old is not a healthy condition to be in). There was some good skating going down, let down by me obviously. Mark Penman was amazing, with all kinds of blunt varitions and a weird body varial to tail to shove it in. I don't know/can't remember the others names but they were really good! Although Chesson is now significantly fatter than me (he's had a mashed up knee for a few months, and has just been sitting around piling on the pounds) he still managed to pull some tricks out the bag including f/s flips and 360 flips etc etc.
We were right next to the Ministry of Sound stage, which hosted all the fashion shows, the best of which was one that involved blokes in just pants on Microscooters getting their arses kicked by birds in PVC catsuits, all to the Charlies Angels theme tune! I was gutted that I had no film in my camera, but bought a roll in time to snap the show on Saturday!
We spent the evening with our host/guide Jamilla in a bar that I can't remember the name of, which had a funk night on. On the way there, Chesson walked full-on into a lamp post. The night was good, Chesson slapped a big fat girls arse and spilt quite a few peoples drinks with a display of blatanly reckless dancing. Our chosen dance style for the evening was called "The Pete King", it involves tilting your head to the side with arms outstretched. I think a lot of people thought we were c**ts, and they were probably right. At Jamilla's we watched the worst TV show ever (called "The Prezzie Show" or something like that) and Chesson gave me a hearty slap round the head, which he tried to film, but being a total numb-nuts he didn't have the camera turned on. In the morning we ate a hearty breakfast at the quality eatery known as McDonalds and headed back to the show for more of the same. Being Saturday it was absolutely packed. We were hurting bad, but ended up skating solidly again. The highlight of my day was catching the afforementioned fashion show on film. The lowlight was taking a piss, only to be joined at the next urinal by a transvestite freak mess. We had to leave at about 4, in order to get to Bristol (see Projects Christmas Bash), so we said our goodbyes and headed back to the GTi. Thankyou to Sewerside for the passes, ramp and general hospitality. Once again the Clothes Show had delivered the goods and we left smiling.
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