Look, I know that I bored you all with my harping on about South Africans and expats, and that you would really like to know what I got up to this weekend. So, here is a brief summary.
Friday night:
I was visited by my ‘bit on the side’ (actually, I’m his bit on the side!) before I went out to meet some friends in the usual haunts in the local gay ghetto. P is a bi builder/scaffolder who works here during the week to return to his wife and 45 children in Sheffield over weekends. We seem to have an understanding and get on rather well but he isn’t the sort of person you’d invite over for a polite dinner party or from whom you’d find a sympathetic ear when discussing the plight of asylum seekers.
Got into town at about 11 and met up with P, a good friend that I met in Cape Town 3 years ago but who, coincidentally, hails from Nottingham. He lives/works in Stevenage now and is off to Australia soon. He was with his latest conquest so I lost him at one stage. Beyond that, I don’t remember much else now.
Saturday:
Tried to read the Guardian but couldn’t get beyond the magazine. Toured the city centre for a while and discovered the South African shop then walked up to the Arboretum to join the ‘gay festivities’. I only got there at 4 but managed to bump into almost every gay person I know in Nottingham. The sun shone at times, people were walking their dogs, the place reverberated with trashy cover versions of gay ‘tchoons’, every one drank a lot – good fun, actually.
Went off to a friend’s birthday party just up the road from me in Sherwood. P (yes, that’s 3 of them now and, yes, they all share the same name) had told me to go to www.chavscum.co.uk to get inspiration for what to wear. Well, had P known my scaffolder, there would have been no need to point me to that site as scaffolder is the epitome of a chav. Good party, all the men were gay, one lesbian couple and one token straight woman. Four of us left at 12.30 pm to see what NG1 had on offer.
NG1 was heaving with people, lots of them new faces to me – here for the Pride event, I suppose. We went our separate ways and I got into one of my frenzied dance modes and hardly left the dance floor until leaving at 3. Unless I’m with someone, those frenzies usually put me into a world of my own, making me oblivious to all around me. However, there was a point at which I seemed to establish a rapport with a rather sexy man on the dance floor. I seem to recall a lot of shy looking at each other but that is as far as it got.
I was in bed by 4.
Sunday:
Tried to read the Observer but couldn’t get beyond the magazine. Phoned a few friends and dozed on and off during the day.
Went to another friend’s birthday BBQ in Arnold (a place he likes to call Mapperley Border, I ask you!) even though the thought of a quiet evening at home seemed much more attractive. Initially, it was all straight couples, single mothers and noisy children, and aged relatives – quite a contrast from the birthday party of the night before. As the night wore on, a hard core remained, drinking gin and vodka (not together) while we danced to whatever was being played on the stereo.
Bed by 3.
Monday:
Hated every minute of work. Spent all evening reading Saturday’s Guardian and Sunday’s Observer.
Bed by 11.
* thanks to lyle who pointed out that I’d misspelt chavscum.
troubled diva 