Mustard on the Hedge

So I think I’ve finally recovered from the exhaustion brought on by shaking my tail feathers at Manchester Pride. Missing Manchester though. I’ve decided it’s my gay narnia. After a shitty few days at work I find myself constantly imagining sitting in a bar in Manchester and of course the sun is shining and all the girls are lesbians and look like Cheryl Cole!

Anyway, I’ve already told you about the parade and the weekend in general but I didn’t get the chance to go into any detail….so here are some nitty gritties!

On Saturday afternoon we went to one of Manchester’s lesbian bars, Vanilla. This is THE lesbian bar in Manchester and one of the best in the UK (and Ireland for that matter as we don’t have any lesbian bars….sigh…deprived). It was as if Vanilla was a giant girl magnet. The closer you got to the bar the more girls you saw! It was strange though…there is actually a lesbian uniform!

Ok, so everyone makes jokes about lesbians loving their Converse but this was unreal! Imagine a sea of lesbians of all sizes each wearing jeans and trainers of some sort. There wasn’t a bag in sight as, of course, lesbians carry all their crap in their pockets. Now don’t get me wrong - there were a few girly girls, bejewelled wearing nice tops and heels but these were definitely in the minority. At Pride lesbians came in two formats…fitted t-shirt, bench jeans and trainers OR tank top, bench jeans and trainers. I also learned at the weekend that lesbians love accessories….thick bracelets, snazzy chunky watches, patterned scarves and so on. The influence of Shane from the L Word was also blatently apparent as girls with their asses hanging out wearing y-fronts were sauntering around completely absorbed in their strut.

The majority of gay guys also seemed to select from two possible outfits…

1. The Mark Ronson i.e. cardigan, skinny jeans, white shirt, tie and trainers…

2. The ‘look at my naked torso-don’t you want me look’ i.e. Jeans and no shirt.

At one stage I thought I might have to put on my sunglasses to deflect the glare from the guy’s fake tan. Hundreds of men fought a battle with Saint Tropez and Saint Tropez clearly won. Many looked almost radioactive!

The guys and girls did have one thing in common….the “homohawk”…or faux hawk as it’s also known.

Taken from http://weblog.xanga.com

I never realised that there is now an official gay haircut. Seriously! On Sunday we spent hours people watching and the number of guys and girls with the same hairdo was unbelievable. I kinda feel left out with my un-gelled flowing locks…perhaps I should get something edgier?

After Vanilla we did a mini pub crawl and ended up in “Essential” one of Manchester’s largest gay clubs. It was good fun apart from the fact the DJ played a Christmas song….depressing!

I meant to write this post yesterday but I was too shattered after my weekend, Oh what a weekend I had! A group of us headed over to Manchester for the18th annual Manchester Pride- one of the largest Pride events in Europe and to sum up the weekend in a word….wow!

We arrived on the Saturday morning and, following a shower in the hotel which was a little too invigorating (almost lost a nipple down the drain due to the insane water pressure), we took ourselves off in the direction of “the Village”- the Canal Street area which is the epicentre of gay life in Manchester. The Pride festivities all take place in almost a four block radius around the centre of Canal Street.

I officially love Canal Street….one long row of gay clubs and pubs boardering a sleepy canal. People can go in to a bar and get drinks and then sit outside and soak up the atmosphere and people-watch the hours away.

The Pride Parade took over the city for two hours as thousands thronged to get a glimpse of buttocks coated in glitter, 87 floats and too many gharish costumes to count. A record breaking number of homosexual police officers took part in the parade- 300 of them- apparently a record for a parade of this kind. Check out some of the parade here:

I’ve been to other Pride festivals where men far out number the women but not in Manchester. I’ve never seen so many hot lesbians in one location- girls everywhere should consider a pilgrimage. There is a different vibe around Manchester Pride as compared to Dublin or Sydney Pride which I attended recently. Manchester doesn’t have the outlandish, circus, camp-tastic people that Sydney Mardi-Gras has. In fact it is actually more like attending a music festival, except a festival at which all the attendees are gay.

Everyone was so chilled…basking in the sun in their wife-beaters with a pint of beer! It was so refreshing to see couples of all ages, colours, shapes and sizes being affectionate in public. There were also a large number of same-sex couple with their kids walking around enjoying themselves which you rarely see in Ireland.

The fashion at Pride was amazing. I’ve concluded that there is a lesbian uniform and a gay uniform…but more on the latest in homo-fashions in my next post. I’ll also write about the clubs and pubs we dipped our toes into. Coffee is required now…In the meantime check out some pictures from the weekend and if any of you attended a pride festival recently let me know your thoughts on it…did it live up to expectations?