The name's Gallop, Bill Gallop.
The suit is back. This is the first self portrait that I have here
but by no means the first that I took. Every year the university held
their
Charter Ball, known to all as the May
Ball, a 12hr+ session of drinking, dancing and singing ostensibly
in celebration of the anniversary of
the university being grated their charter. I was involved in running
the ball for a number of years but in 1987 I was just a member of
the team rather than an organiser, this gave me a chance to actually
enjoy
some of it, something that I did not do again until 2002 when I went
back to see how things had changed.
This was the first time that I had worn the suit in anger on my own so
I splashed out on red silk, tie, hankie (look at the size if it!) and
cummerbund. These were joined by a somewhat nasty pair of red plastic
loafers which were, thankfully, only ever worn on this occasion. I
took Julia Plum to the ball, I had met Julia during my Freshers week
where I managed to get her mixed up with one of her friends wo looked
nothing like her at all. Julia was in her final year, studying Environmental
Health, and so would have been something like 4 years older than me.
A mysterious older woman considering the fact that I was only 19 at
the time.
Unfortunately
I had not taken into account the fact that Julia was meeting someone
else there and so on the only occasion that I managerd to get her
to go on what kind of started as a date she went off with someone else
within the hour. I think the lesson learnt here is to make sure that
both parties realise that they are on a date rather than just the
one.
She thought that she was just turning up with a friend. |
