I gave the snowman a facial, a pedicure, a manicure and plucked his eyes brows.

The Snowman

I met a snowman once, at a function. He wasn’t part of the function, he just happened to be staying at the hotel on business. When everyone had gone I stayed behind had a few more bevies and I bought an expensive Cuban cigar. I thought – fuck it! Let’s be decadent like the toffs. I bought it, but I didn’t have a light. So, I went up to him half cut and said in a really put on thick Salford accent “Excuse sir would you light my rather large Cuban cigar?” Which he did. I sat with him and his business partner for about half hour, we had a bit of laugh. He then passed me his card and insisted that I visit him the following weekend at his country estate in Malvern.


I knew he was wealthy but I wasn’t expecting him to be as wealthy as he was. I felt really embarrassed. I arrived with my battered Marks and Spencer’s carpet bag. He had a four acre estate and two houses on it, a barn, a fountain, a collection of expensive cars. And I arrived with torn Primark jeans on and cheap bottle of wine.

The first thing he did was he took me upstairs and led me into a bedroom. We’re talking king-sized four poster bed. I thought no way. I am not doing this. He insisted I sit down on the end of the bed, which I did. He said, “Close your eyes” which I did. I said “What are you doing?” I was terrified. He whispered in my ear “I want you to relax. I have something to show you, it’s a surprise.” I started to feel sick at that point. He said “Give me your hands”.
“Why? What do you want my hands for?” Reluctantly I held out my hands. He then placed it, on top of my hands. What a relief I felt when I realised what it was. I opened my eyes – it was a laptop. ‘Why? Why have you given me a laptop?”

He said “look at the photograph”. He pointed to a photograph of a woman, fully clothed, standing outside a shopping centre. She was wearing a short denim mini skirt, knee high suede brown boots, a canary yellow blouse, long brown hair. She had a neat little figure, not bad looking I thought. “Who is this woman?”
“Guess”.
“Okay, you’re married obviously. Look I don’t want anything heavy. I just came up for a laugh.”
“No, I am definitely not married, look again”
“It’s your sister?”
“No!” he started laughing.
I continued to study the woman.
“Well it can’t be your bloody mum, because this woman is about your age. Not unless she’s had a lot of surgery. Actually…..” I looked up at him, and as a joke I said “Is this you mate? You’re not one of those freaky cross dressers are you?” Then I started laughing. At this point he had stopped laughing and looked a bit stern.
“It is you mate, isn’t it?”

It was him.
He was a bloody cross dresser. He then asked me what size I was. He said, “You must be about a 12?”
“Yes I am.”
He then proceeded to show me his immense wardrobe. We spent the weekend trying on his clothes, exchanging makeup tips. I even gave him a facial, plucked his eyes brows, waxed his legs, smeared on lots of expensive Harvey Nichols lotions and potions. It was a lot of fun. But there was another side to him (God’s honest truth – ask JH, I told him this story last year). He was a fucking squirrel killer. He had a rifle in his kitchen, which he kept on the welsh dresser. We were sat having lunch, wearing white towelling robes, both with avocado face masks on and he abruptly stood up and went …..

“Fuckers!!!!’ He was distracted and appeared really troubled by something outside, he just stood there staring out of the kitchen window.

“What’s wrong?”

“Wait there!” he said. He looked incredibly angry.

He ran over to the welsh dresser, grabbed the rifle and ran out into the yard. I followed him, only to discover that he was aiming it at a squirrel’s tiny head,
“What the hell are you doing?”
“Shut up, oh bollocks, it’s gone now. I’ll get it later, when you’ve gone!”

It was a lovely break for me. He showed me Malvern, the hills; he even turned his fountain on for me, we strolled around his estate. On the morning I was due to go home, it was snowing, in fact it had been snowing all night. So I said to him, because I felt that he was more like a sister than a lover.
“Why don’t we take all of our clothes off and roll around in the snow. I promise you won’t break a nail, and if you do I am happy to give you a manicure, before I go back to Hackney.” And he agreed, and that is exactly what we did. We had a snow ball fight at eight o'clock in the morning, completely starkers.