Summer Breeze

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I’ve kept myself amused during these blisteringly sunny few days by looking at people’s bodies on the train. Not, I grant you, a normal way to pass a few hours, so perhaps I’d better explain.

I’ve had a blast over this past, hot and sunny, week commuting to Smooth Radio and sweltering on my journey. Normally I hate London transport and would rather be superglued to a bed of nails with someone pouring nail varnish remover in my eyes whilst Gordon Brown ransacks my home, but this week the journeys have never been so interesting or gone by so quickly.

My reading matter would usually consist of one of those freebie newspapers or, if I’m really lucky, a discarded McDonalds promotion wrapper, but this week I’ve kept things much simpler and just read everyone’s tattoos. Lots of sun equals fewer clothing and more body art work on display, and so I pass my time making up stories to go with the little butterflies or large Harley Davidson tramp stamps that decorate pink sizzling flesh as it hangs over shorts that fitted five years ago but will never fit again.

I noticed one girl who had the word VICTORIAN tatooed on her upper arm, which to you probably means she studies history, or longs for a more innocent and easier period when women had more free time – no need for leg waxes or moustache tinting. But that’s why you might not be cut out for this imagination lark. Closer inspection showed slightly different inks on some of the letters so I spent the journey imagining how it came about. I reckon she’d once gone out with a guy called Vic who dumped her so she changed the tattoo to Victoria before someone suggested that might look a bit on the lesbian side and she added the N at the end. By the time I’d sorted her story in my head, we’d arrived at Waterloo.

On the journey home, another guy had a heart with SALT written in it. Now, unless he’s a foodie who’s tired of the health police, I reckon he dated someone called Sal who broke his heart and so he added the other letter to show what she’d rubbed in his wounds. See, once you get started, you can’t stop.

The only problem with turning the train in to a reading room on a hot day is the rising stench of BO. The temperature in London seems inversely proportional to the number of baths people take, and as for getting on the Tube with fat people giving their armpits an airing, you may as well bury your head in a bag full of dead rats marinated in vinegar. I’m all for people not being self consumed and spending the day pampering themselves but a bit of cleanliness and deodorant wouldn’t be too much to ask would it? And, maybe, the occasional shaving of underarm hair? Here, I’m talking about men as well as women as the burst mattress look just acts as a breeding programme for smelly bacteria which jump out with a gleeful “Wheeeeee” every time I’m standing under some sweaty strap hanger.

Those guys who aren’t wearing sleeveless vests are turning out in force in that old staple the football shirt and seeing them, in all the colours of the rainbow, shows up the stupidity of marketing people as the sponsors' logos on the shirts mean nothing to me. Presumably the advertisers have paid a fortune for the exposure but do you know what Manchester United’s AIG is, or Birmingham’s F&C, or even Everton’s Chang? I wouldn’t know whether to drink an AIG, eat it, or ask it to look after my pension.

Of course, as a guy, the sun does give us the perk of watching women walking down the street wearing fewer clothes than Madonna and, so long as they don’t look like her, that’s fine. Don’t get me wrong, if Madge wants to walk around in corsets and stockings then good for her. Old folk should have porn too. But I just don’t think the High Street is the place for it and if you’re going to carry it off you need a bit of suntan. As we’re emerging from the rainy dark days of Spring, Londoners all look a bit Scottish with pasty faces and corn beef legs – and I say this as a proud Scotsman myself. The few times we get to see the sun north of the border, we assume it’s a disco ball and throw a party.

As bras go back in the drawer for summer, the older girls seem to delight in getting their pendulous boobies out with every sun ray and even the younger girlies are getting their flip flops out too. I mean, of course, those shoes for the beach which look fine in the sand but are an impossible look to carry off elsewhere. The sound of the rubber scuffing on the pavement reminds me of my dad’s great aunt who worked in her son’s café till she was a hundred and eighty six. It is the sound of the careworn and tired who have no energy to pick up their feet. Guys are even worse as they usually wear them with brown socks, a look best described as “Guy who buys Thai bride on the internet”.

Unfortunately the end of this seasonal frivolity is drawing to a close as the weather forecast here in London is for rain returning by the end of the week. Then, fashion will improve, rolls of fat will go back to being hidden, and the sleeveless vests will be packed away alongside the cheery smiles for strangers.

The air will be sweeter but, my God, the train journey to work won’t be half as interesting.