A TRAMP SANDWICH (No, this is not a sexual position)

I'll never forget the first time that I was mistaken for a gay hustler.

It was about four years ago, and I was underneath the arches near Waterloo station doling out sandwiches and rolls to the kind of people who would give their home address as No 3 Cardboard Box, The Arches, Waterloo.

Every Friday my friend Mick 'Le Grand Cocque' Harris (a self-proclaimed epitet, I might add) and I used to visit the local bakeries at the end of shop hours to buy up all the soon-to-be-out-of-date sarnies at cut price. Then we used to call upon the various Tramp areas in the city and dish out the free grub.

We did this to make ourselves feel good (isn't that why everyone does things for charity?) and the homeless people certainly appreciated it. They might still have smelled of vodka and piss, but at least they were fed.

"Let me take you by the hand ..."

Mick and I had been Welsh Gigolos for about 5 months, (actually Mick was from Wrexham which everyone knows isn't Real Wales) and we were still feeling quite ashamed about the whole thing - where I was from I was taught that sex is dirty. In Mick's case, quite literally. He told me that the first time he and his girlfriend indulged in a spot of anal intercourse was precisely the same moment the poor woman was struck with the worst case of projectile diarrhoea on record. Soon, they were the stars in their own private version of the little Dutch boy plugging the leaky dyke. Only with liquid faeces .

Anyway, back to the plot. To offset some of the shame associated with our prostitution, and to earn some Heaven reward points with the man upstairs, the idea of The Tramp Sandwich was born.

However, that same Friday evening, we were arrested by undercover policecops (they were dressed in tramp clothes and stank of piss - At least I think they were undercover ...)

We were detained that whole night in the cells because the detectives believed that we were not charity workers, but two good looking Welsh bastards touting for bum fun.

It was news to me at the time, but "Would you like corned beef roll?" was apparently some kind of code instigating homosexual intercourse, kind of like the days when you carried a green handkerchief to advertise the fact that you would take a man's cock up your bottom. (My Grandad carried a handkerchief - once he had a cold, his handkerchief turned green, he got all sorts of propositions!)

Four of the burliest officers Metropolitan Police beat the living shit out of me and Mick. From this I sensed that the police force took a dim view to the gaylords.

I was kept on my own in a cell until the following morning when I was visited by the Chief Superintendent. He made an offer - £50 to give him a blowjob. God, I must have been so innocent back then, because I told him that I didn't have £50 on me.

When he put me straight on the matter, and said that he would pay me the money, I calmly informed him that I wasn't a rent boy, merely a friend of the tramps. Then, four of the burliest officers in the Metropolitan police then beat the living shit out of me. Do you know, I reckon the cops hate everyone.

Geoff's Blog: Keeping it up on a blow-by-blow basis.

Geoff Prickett (It's pronounced Prickett!)
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