53 years old; single; antiques dealer; always on the look out for a unique piece (of ass!)
The Date
A drink at a Mayfair Gentleman's private members club. Mr Lounge Lizard is engulfed in a Red Chesterfield Wing Back Arm Chair clutching a humongous G+T, probably not his first by the looks of his flushed face and silly grin as I rock up to greet him. Mr Lounge Lizard is wearing red cords, yellow socks, brown suede loafers with gold snaffle, blue pin stripe shirt, a paisley cravat...he looks old, weathered, battered so is well suited to the world of antiques! This man is need of some restoration me thinks. He tells me about his shop on the Kings Road and his clients that he has built up over many years of wheeling and dealing. An antique is an item over 100 years old, he tells me, however recently, certain dealers are considering 50 years as a benchmark for an item to be is considered Antique. So he is himself a potential antique I quip...he laughs...! There's talk of the differences between antiques, vintage pieces and collectibles. In Mr Lounge Lizard's opinion antiques are over 100 years old, collectibles over 50 years old and vintage pieces, the term he tells me, originally applied to the age of a bottle of wine, it was hijacked and is now used to describe an item that has cycled back into fashion or is less than 25 years old. 25 years old. Mmm...maybe I can transcend this theory to my next dates Mr Vintage and Mr Collectible...Mr Antique....are there any men on the dating circuit over 100 years of age or would that result in a date with a difference at an old people's home or warden assisted housing for a liquid lunch....maybe a step too far. He is a little eccentric and seems to have an overzealous saliva duct production culminating in a wet grin, not dis-similar to a jowly boxer dog...Turner and Hooch styley!! So it seems that this is Antiques Roadshow meets American Gigolo meets last of the Summer Wine. Mr Lounge Lizard has perfected the gliding manoeuvre from said leather armchair to bar...a bit like the air hockey game that you get at the UCI cinema complexes, or maybe he's just pissed! Yes I think that is the case as his conversation skills are plummeting at a rate quicker than HBOS shares and he is now unknowingly doing an expert impression of Tommy Cooper...slurring fashion..."Just Like That!" Time to leave the old reptile to it...something tells me Mr Lounge Lizard spends most afternoons/evenings in this bar, ahead of Stringfellows and that the little antiques shop on the Kings Road is probably open mornings only....as I leave the bar, I glance back to Mr Lounge Lizard and it dawns on me David Dickinson...it's not him....but it could be! Still searching.....for that unique antique of a man who is in MINT condition...is he out there???