Ice Skating

When I was a nipper and lived in the north-east, we used to go ice skating at this massive rink in Tynemouth- it was an old aircraft hangar, really scruffy. For about 15 years, they played Andy William's 'Can't Take my Eyes Off You'every time we went- it got more and more crackly, until I suppose the needle just grooved though to the other side and it completely eroded. I used to love it, although I fell down constantly. There was always at least one very clever three-year-old in a cutesy skating dress trimmed with white fur round the edges, pirouetting, jumping, skating backwards, you know, just being generally irritating. Our foster-cousin Ted was brilliant at it- he only went once, but within seconds was skating on one leg, holding his foot with one hand, falling over, not caring...
Last year I started going skating wth Gina, early on a Thursday morning. The rink was deserted apart from a few older men and ladies, who were good at it but not so good you felt embarrassed falling over. Skating is about as close as you can get to flying without leaving the ground! There was an old man there who had been a skating teacher and he yelled advice at you whether you wanted it or not. Eventually, I realised he was good and I just went with the flow. I couldn't skate backwards, though. I asked a rather lonely looking chap how to do it, as he was skating backwards all the time (analyse that, you psychologists!) but he said,'I don't know'. Which wasn't much use. And of course, the very clever person was there- this time, a young man in very tight trousers who managed to pirouette, jump, skate backwards, all the things that the clever three-year-old could do, while simultaneously sucking in his cheeks so hard that his eyeballs nearly popped out.