Thonglateer Extraordinaire

Because I’ll be busy for the next few days as I sit and stare unblinking at a computer screen, I thought I’d keep the blog active by offering you all a sneak peak at my latest opus. It’s called ‘Thonglateer Extraordinaire!’ and I think it’s the most honest account of life on the North Wales stripping circuit. It also happens to be my autobiography.

Gabby is the mastermind behind the book, and she’s even designed a cover for it in anticipation of our flogging it all my gigs in the next year. The first chapter covers my early life and the training that goes into becoming a successful man of the thong. Today, I’m posting the first part of chapter 1.

Thonglateer Extraordinaire!
By
Chip Dale

Chapter I

The Five Mysteries of One Eye Buchanan

I’ll mention it only once so we don’t have to mention it again: yes, I know who I look like.

I’m sure it’s as much a curse to me as it’s a blessing to him. But believe me when I say that I know nothing about the Liberal Democrat’s policy on second homes in Wales and I’m also certain that Lembit Opik doesn’t know the first thing about indulging female fantasies involving pots of home-made raspberry jam and a plasterer’s trowel. Or if he does, I’m sure he keeps it out of his manifesto promises.

Which just backs up the point I’m making: I’m not him and he’s not me. I mean, if I was him, would I be stripping for a living? Okay, perhaps I would. I really can’t say. I’ve not met the man. But I do know myself and I know the path I have taken to become the most successful male stripper in Wales. And if that’s the story you want to hear, then you’re in luck. That’s the story I’m about to tell.

The path that led me to my start on the Welsh stripping circuit began one October night in the nineteen eighties when a baby was born with unusually well-defined abdominal muscles and a delight in shaking his unreasonably large genitals at all the nurses. There, you might say, the legend was born and I’ve hardly changed since. I’m still covered in baby oil, only now the nurses are often drunk, it’s usually Friday night at the Green Dragon Tavern in the heart of Bangor’s town centre, and instead of my blanket, I’m to be found swaddled in a plumber’s outfit or dressed like a bare-arsed cowboy.

With the name Chip Dale, I suppose stripping was in my stars, or at least as far as taking your clothes off for a living can be said to be augured by an alignment of the spheres, if you’ll excuse the early and totally unwarranted descent to the double entendre. There are few jobs that a man can do in Wales when he’s blessed by fantastic good looks, a body sculpted from Italian marble, and a personality to match. The fact that I disliked underwear from an early age merely added to the unusual set of circumstances which led to my declaring to my family on my sixteenth birthday that I was moving to Bangor to become the best know thongman on the face of the Welsh earth.

For the record, I was christened Crispen Walter Dale. I normally tell people that my mother was inspired by the St. Crispen’s Day speech from Henry the Fifth but I intend to be nothing less than honest with you. I was actually named after the Crisp’n Dry adverts from the seventies. My mother had an addiction to fried potato snacks, which is probably why I was known from an early age as Chip.

My life as a stripper began in my formative school years. I’d always take longer than the other boys whenever we changed for gym and I remember the PE teacher once putting me on report for taking off all my clothes when we were only meant to be changing into our pumps to watch some actors perform Shakespeare in the gym. But that was me. I knew what I wanted to do with my life and I took every opportunity to prepare for it.

It was, I see now, an unusual decision for a young man to make but stripping was my calling and I could never betray it. I remember once being given one of those computerised career tests just before I left school. When my results came out of the printer, I was shocked to see that it had recommended veterinary work. I demanded to see the career’s advisor and I marched indignantly into his office to ask him why male stripping wasn’t an option. He just turned white.

‘Why would you want to become a stripper, Dale?’ asked the man in a grey suit and topped by a wayward combover.

‘Well, sir, I think I have what it takes.’

He ran a finger around his collar, looked nervously towards his office door and then slapped down his hair which had leapt up in apparent shock. Only then did he stand up and quietly close the door before leaning his weak back against the frosted glass which magnified the rattle in his chest.

‘And what do you think it takes to become a stripper, Dale?’ he wheezed.

‘A big personality, sir.’

‘A big personality?’

‘Oh yes, sir. A big personality and rhythm.’

‘Rhythm?’

‘To dance, sir. I don’t reckon you can’t be a male stripper if you can’t dance.’

‘I suppose not,’ he said, his throat suddenly sounding quite dry. He walked slowly back across the room and sat down at his desk where he began to sort career pamphlets for people wanting to work at the Bradford and Bingley. The poor man. I can see now that he was well out of his depth. I don’t suppose he would have known what to say if I’d gone in there wanting to become a nuclear physicist or a Bavarian bugle salesman. ‘Well, so long as you think you’ve got what it takes,’ he muttered finally and shifted his glasses on his nose. ‘I mean, I wouldn’t like to stand in your way, Dale, but you must understand that I can’t recommend this choice of employment. You never heard it from me.’ He briefly smiled and gave me a flash of tobacco stained teeth. ‘You’ve not considered office work? The Bradford and Bingley offer a very reasonable pension plan.’

‘Office work?’ I shifted uneasily where I stood. ‘I don’t think a big personality and a dexterity about the hips suit the Bradford and Bingley, sir.’ And as if to prove my point, I demonstrated the Chipster’s hip-swivel that would later become one of my signature moves.

‘So, you don’t like the idea of office work at the Bradford?’ he laughed, hesitantly.

‘Of course not, sir. I was born to strip.’

‘Were you? Well, good luck to you, Dale. We all have out crosses to bear and I can see that yours is bigger than most.’

‘You can say that again,’ I replied and gave him another thrust of my hips.

‘Yes, well, could you please stop that now?’ he asked, the slight flush that had reappeared on his cheeks now disappearing for good. ‘And I’d prefer it if our little conversation doesn’t go any further than this room. Wouldn’t like it said that I recommended a lad take his clothes off for a living.’

‘I quite understand. I don’t suppose you get many people coming in here saying they want to become a male stripper.’

He laughed and took off his pen top for no apparent reason before realising his mistake and screwing it back on.

‘No, no, you are quite unique, Dale,’ he replied, shaking his head. ‘But so long as you think you’ve got what it takes I don’t want to dissuade you. To tell you the truth, dissuading people isn’t my job. I’m here to give you all positive vibes.’

‘Oh, I’ve got positive vibes, sir.’

‘I can see that, Dale. And good luck with them. Good luck with your big personality, your sense of rhythm, and your positive vibes. I can see that you’ve got what it takes to be… to be… er…’ He looked down a paper on his desk as he almost whispered. ‘A male exotic dancer.’

‘Of course, sir. I don’t suppose it does any harm having an enormous penis.’

He looked at me long and hard. ‘No, Dale,’ he said, with a look of utter envy. ‘I don’t suppose it does you any harm whatsoever.’

I was given special dispensation to leave school early that day and I never went back. Nor did Mr. Morris who I’m told arrived at the staff-room complaining of feeling unwell and went home soon after lunch. He was never seen again. Some say he retired to a monastery but others say he went to live in Thailand before he died after spending five years indulging in untold carnal delights. Some say he just back a Liberal Democrat. I don’t like to think my interview had anything to do with his disappearance, though when the nights are long and my spirits depressed, I often think of Mr. Morris, his grey suit, his combover, his weak chest. I wonder if the Thai air did him any good, or whether once touched by Chip Dale’s dream, he couldn’t live with himself. In a way, you might say that just the dream of being the Chipster had killed a lesser man.