Tony
It really gets to me when I can't remember names and almost as bad is when I can't remember surnames. We met at the Hotel El Dorado in Benalmedina where I spent a great holiday with my then fiancee Claire. Tony, a travel agent from Sheffield, is a great joker and was a vital element in our having such a great holiday.
Tony is on the far right of this picture (just after having caught a little too much sun.) and to my left is Claire and between us all is a young lady who starred in a BBC soap set on the Costa del Sol entitled El Dorado.
There was everything and it's uncle wrong with the hotel and I can remember that the thing that got Tony the most was the red wax the cleaners used on the floors because it'd leave peoples feet red.
One night we went to see a comedian in a nearby pub and we were heckling a little. The comedian eyed us and as quick as a flash said to Tony, "Flaming Hell! You actually underline a nose like that!"
Bar Miguel
Bar Miguel, in Benaldmedina is one of the most fun bars I have ever experienced in my life.
True, the owner Miguel and his sidekick Arturo are in drag but once you get over that you'll not stop laughing.
Even if you don't particularly like flamenco (which I do) You'll enjoy the dancing of the two and Miguel's own shows. I'm not at all homophobic but on the other side I'm not totally into the gay scene but I must say that we kept on going back, night after night.
If anyone ever wondered where my bottle-top party trick came from - wonder no more, the picture says it all.
The next picture shows Arturo who was a real balance of comical facial expressions to go against Miguels deadpan look. With Arturo is Tony from Sheffield who we met on the holiday and with whom we had a great time.
Sally and Sandra
My good man Steve Goodfriend ... or rather good friend Steve Goodman and I decided to duck out of the high life of Grimsby for a few days and take a day trip (Believe it!) to Bilbao, northern Spain in March of '95. I'd seen the advert somewhere and the trip was ridiculously cheap so 'wayhey!' and off to spain we went.
The trip itself consisted mainly of drinking and looking at the sea so we were highly thankful for the chance of company (especially female company) when I rescued a pair of girls who were being unsuccessfully 'chatted up' by a drunk Norwegian.
At first, as the girls were speaking German, I mistook both to be German, however although Sandra Kosanke (far right) does come from Germany, Sally Northeast (second from left) is a reporter from Bournemouth.
Understandably my Bournemouth / Pensioner city jokes went down like a lead balloon but notwithstanding a good time was had by all (As can be seen from the photo below).
Later in the year I'd just seen Li Aguiar off at Heathrow on her way back to Brazil and was walking towards a coffee bar at the airport when through the crowds came Sandra walking completely in the opposite direction in a straight line towards me. We sat and chatted for a while but there was absolutely no reason for my sudden craving for a coffee (not at airport prices) save for the invisible forces that often bring us together time and time again.
[an error occurred while processing this directive]
We chatted for a while and call me slow but it was after we had gone on together to another bar that it clicked that this was the very same guy who wanted turkey sandwich from the previous day.
