Bollard
Now, I should point out that my own 'mad skillz' with the ladies are not the most fine or honed. They usually consist of getting blind drunk and then saying something witty and erudite (read 'confusing and garbled) before leaving in what could only very charitably be called a 'dignified retreat', and would more accurately be called a panicked stumble. I, however, fall somewhat short in the incompetence stakes, of a gentleman who came to be known as 'bollard'.

As a teenager, the local music-school used to run yearly tours to foreign parts, a chance for young adults to go and play music for a couple of hours a day to bermused locals, and then spend the rest of the time either blind drunk, chasing pretty young ladies, or both.

Bollard, bless him, took to this second task with great gusto. His first pass, which we only heard about later, consisted of him going down 2 flights of stairs and into the apartment of a group of girls. These were members of the tour, who recognised him, but he was hardly firm friends. His 'moves' consisted of striding into the room, pausing a fraction, and then saying "hang on, I don't want to look gay", before changing his black shirt for a green vest.

I'll repeat that, changing his smart black shirt, for a skin-tight, neon-lime-green vest. In front of a group of confused young ladies he barely knew. Needless to say, his luck was not in. Incidentally, it was the neon-orange counterpart to this vest, when worn with the matching neon-orange shorts, that earned him the short-lived nickname of 'traffic cone', which mutated swiftly to the much more manageable 'bollard'.

A couple of weeks later, back in blighty, a group of us were in London going to a prom. Bollard was not with us, but made his presence felt by making a move on one of the ladies in our party, by the time-honoured medium of text message. Time has erased the exact text of the message from my memory, but I am pretty sure the last line was "txt bk 4 sm ht lvn". For the benefit of any laymen who may have wandered in, or those of you over the age of 13, this loosely translates as "text back for some hot loving."

Now, this missive is not, in and of itself, necessarily the worst chat-up attempt in history, but give it context. Bollard was, at the time,a pimply 14 year old. "I", the lady to whom it was directed, was (if memory serves) 19, and a goddess-like creature, all curves and wafting eyelashes. You can't fault his ambition, if nothing else.

Bless you, bollard, and any recipient of your 'ht lvn'.
(Serotonicity was a naughty boy on..., Thu 10 Dec 2009, 19:11, Reply)