Two pumps a day

 

Updates:

Gender GP - my appraisal pathway is now complete,  I have been recommended the following treatment:

Estradiol 0.06% gel - Apply 2 pumps a day (1.5mg) - once in the morning - Supply 3 x 80g bottles

I am now awaiting a message from 'Clynxx' who will be handling my prescription and delivering it !

Other health

I seem to have lost hearing in my right ear, this is sub optimal. Colonoscopy for my bowel issues tomorrow evening, so I have to starve for a bit, I've eaten my last food today at 3pm, won't get any more until 7pm tomorrow.  

Adventures:

Peterborough Beer Festival  - Day 1

I went to this on the Thursday and Friday last week with my friends Alice , Gemma, Cindy, Rebekah and Trisha.

Alice had booked a table for lunch at a really nice micro brewery pub , so I had to set off fairly early to get there for midday. I was in the Leaf as didn't want to be worrying about the Morris getting stolen, as there was no secure parking nearby.  

 I charged at Markham Moor Starbucks on the way down, I popped in for a croissant and a drink while it charged - I recall feeling a little more unsafe than normal, as I couldn't hear out of my right ear, which gave me less situational awareness !

When I had parked near the hotel, and plugged my car in for a slow charge, I headed off into the city centre in search of the others.  I met up with Alice, Cindy and Rebekah in the central square, we did a bit of shopping then headed to 'The Brewery Tap' for lunch.  

This turned out to be a Thai place, which I was not expecting, but was a pleasant surprise. I had squid to start, followed by neck of Pork with some boiled rice.  It was really nice, good beer too, I tried JHB.

After this we headed back to the Premier Inn for a mandatory outfit change, then onwards to the Beer festival venue just over the road.  I stayed with my real hair as was worried I would be too hot, and put on a long dress with a nice slit up the side.

It was a very very long bar with hundreds of beers in a big long marquee. I can't remember how many I tried that evening, but I was taking it steady as didn't want to be ill for the next day. I was drinking
halves and having plenty of water in between too.

I had a German cheese filled sausage from a food van outside to help soak up some of the alcohol, and a beef and stilton pasty towards the end of the night.

It was a really good night , we had some nice comments from some people. No bad interactions at all really. Felt very safe and welcome. 

It closed at 11pm and we were herded out of the tent, and headed straight back to the hotel. 

Peterborough Beer Festival  - Day 2

We met up at 9 and had the usual cooked breakfast, then I headed out with Alice, Rebekah and Cindy to explore Peterborough.  We did the Cathedral first which was very impressive, but had the back half closed off for a Star Wars exhibit that we were not really fussed about. 

Then spent some time wandering around the outside of it in a warren of old streets. After this we headed to the museum , which was really good. We had a drink in the café there, and wandered around for a bit. 

They had a Victorian operating theatre on the top floor which was very interesting.

We then went back to the hotel for our afternoon outfit change 🤣  - but before heading to the beer festival venue we went to Charters, which is a restaurant/bar on a bit barge moored on the canal. 

Here we met up with Gemma - who was in fab drab mode, and we had a beer and some chips to keep us going.  They were serving a beer called 'Slack Alice' which we all found amusing.

Then we headed back to the beer festival, and stayed there for an hour or so, it was pretty quiet. Then back to the hotel once more for our evening outfits. I had been drinking coke as I was nodding off in the afternoon sun :).  Gemma was glamming up so wasn't with us until a bit later.

I put on my silver wig, and a shinny dress and touched up my makeup a little bit, and we all met in reception just before 4pm.

We had some beer, and chatted to a few nice people. We did a walking video from one end of the tent to the other - which turned out really well. 

It was getting a lot busier , due to people going there straight from work, and it soon got quite hard to move. 

There was a guy ( not pictured) who did a really bad job of sneaking a photo of us, he was sending it to someone and I managed to peer over his shoulder and start to read the message, but Cindy interrupted him and I only got to see a few words.  He was describing us as hot i think, but he acted very embarrassed when confronted, not sure if it was going to be a 'lol' at the end or not.  He moved away pretty quickly.

We did get some nice comments again, the general theme for them was always along the lines of "well done for doing what you are doing, and looking fabulous". We had at least one guy come up who was a closeted dresser and wanted to
introduce themselves - which is quite brave  !

Towards the end of the night, my feet were killing due to standing up for so long - even in my comfy sandals. We did manage to find a table outside for a bit. But it was getting quite cold out there, and started to rain a bit, so we went back in side.  

We watched the band for a bit in the entertainment tent, they were really good.  We had decided to leave a little early, to avoid the rush, and go back to Charters which stayed open much later.

We had a really good time in there, there was a DJ playing vinyl singles, he didn't seem that good to start with, but his choices got steadily better, and was really loving his set.

Had some nice interactions with a few people, some girls told me about a really good charity shop which I noted down for the morning. The beer was good, and I think I actually drank more in the last few hours in there than I had the whole afternoon :)

I can't remember what time we got in, but I made sure to drink loads of water. 

Peterborough Day 3 

This was a heading home day, I had breakfast with all those still able - Alice was dying :)  

Then I did some packing while Cindy was looking at Gemma's VR headset. 

After this me Cindy and Rebekah headed into the centre to do some charity shops. I got 7 dresses, but unfortunately three don't fit me. Might take them to chams perhaps.

I also bagged a hand crank Bakelite insulation resistance tester !  which was nice. 

We had to check out by midday, so we headed back and I packed the car and departed.  Stopped off at Markham Moor on the way back to charge, they have some fab Shell ones there, 4 chargers. 

I had said I might pop into Lincoln to go to the Steampunk fair, but I was too tired and it had rained while I was charging, so thought I best just go home.  

Spent the afternoon fixing the Morris. 

It was a fab few days, and really enjoyed it, I have booked a hotel for the Sheffield beer festival in October :) 

Making progress

 

Life Updates :

So a quick summary of key events in the weeks since Leeds pride :

GenderGP: 

I have started my monthly £30 subscription, this means they will send my application off for final review, and I should hear back from them in a few weeks. I should get my prescription at this time, and be able to start on the microdose Estrogen. 

A link in case of interest to anyone :

https://www.gendergp.com/hormones-and-microdosing-does-it-have-to-be-all-or-nothing/

A small but significant step.

Hair:

I think I forgot to mention in my last post,  but I dyed my hair, this was at the end of July just before LFF. I used Clairol Nice'n Easy colour 6G (Light golden brown). The colour is still good, I can start to see some grey on my roots now. 

Pic to the right is at Wakefield at the start of the month:

I ordered some cheap straighteners, and attempted to sort the curls at the back, but it's still quite short back there and wasn't too successful.  I did have a go on the rest of it, and it looked pretty good on that though. I used heat protection spray with them too of course.

I also tried some 'shine' product Bed Head by TIGI , which seemed to make it look nicer.

I've not been wearing my daytime wigs since really, swapping to the silver one with blue tint for my night time look.

Health:

I have been suffering with digestive issues, got booked in for a colonoscopy next week ! - such fun. My feet are still healing from Leeds pride, as long as I don't wear those same shoes I should be fine. 

The patch of skin I lost when removing the boob tape is better now, but still a red area. 

Events attended :

Wakefield Pride 

The weather was a bit poor, but I had a fab day out with my friends from Trans Wakefield at the pride. There were not nearly as many people lining the streets as my first Wakefield pride last year.  I was at least marching in the parade with people I knew this time, rather than tagging on the end.

There were plenty of people in the parade though, and the main event area was rammed with colourfully dressed people. There was some nice food on, I was quite hungry and had a venison burger, and a falafel wrap !

I hung around the main event for a while, and had half a flat cider which was very nice. 

Then a few of us went to the 'Our House' LGBTQ+ café for a beverage and a cake in the early afternoon. I departed after this, I wasn't drinking due to the tummy issues, and also I had to drive my wife somewhere in the morning.

Lincoln Pride 

I couldn't go down on Friday night as my wife needed picking up just after 5pm, and didn't see the point in going if I couldn't have the whole day there. So I went down Saturday morning instead. 

I took the Morris Minor, just to make life more interesting :)  

I was sharing a room with Lexi to keep costs down, Gemma and Cindy , and Jennifer and Justine were also coming. 

I wore a shortish summer dress, my trainers with the Trans coloured laces (got the laces free at Leeds pride), and my grey bag - there was an A4 size limit at the main venue.

I met up with Lexi, Gemma and Cindy around 10:30am by the arch thingy which i always forget the name of.  It didn't seem that well organised, they had to disperse the people waiting to form up to move one of the floats through.  Gemma was adorned with sequins and LED's so had been given a place on

the floats, but chose the back one as the front was rammed.

We set off at 11:30am, and did a short walk - interrupted by the railway crossing.  There were lots of people cheering us on, but possibly because it wasn't that local I didn't seem to feel as much for it all as the Leeds and Wakefield ones. It was still nice to be a part of it though.

I saw Jennifer and Justine in the crowd as we were past the crossing, and diverted out to grab them, and they joined us for the remainder of it.  

We ended up at the main event  just before 12pm , and had to queue for a while as they were searching everyone's bags. 

We did the stalls, got some drinks, and watched the performers on the stage for a few hours. Some of them were pretty good - mainly dancers and drag performers. They had the Viaduct show girls on for a couple numbers - but we didn't find them as impressive really. 

We left just before 3pm so we could check into our hotel room, Cindy came with us too.  Then had a quick pint, and then headed off to a quirky little pub called 'The tiny tavern' where we had another one. 

Then myself Cindy and Lexi did pizza at Zizzi's , before going back to our room to change for the evening. 

We met up with Gemma, who had glammed back up, and had a few in the Carousel, then we headed to
Popworld where we stayed until just before midnight I think. 

Jennifer and Justine met us in Popworld, and stayed for an hour or so, but they had tickets for the
official afterparty at 'The Scene' so left us to head there.

They had some very good music in there, and with the light up dancefloor and a few entertaining locals it was a very good atmosphere.

I did get described as 'a man' by one of the girls waiting for a cubicle in the loos, which stung a little. Never really had much of that, didn't really expect it - it wasn't an LGBTQ+ venue though. I guess it's much more likely to happen. 

But overall it was a really fantastic day, and evening, and great to catch up with the girls.

Lincolnshire Steam and Vintage Rally

My friend Alice was displaying her tractors at a rally just up the road on the same weekend - which was why she wasn't with us. So myself and Lexi had said we would pop over and visit on the Sunday.

The drive there was fairly uneventful, but the gearbox seemed more crunchy. We got to the show and wandered around and had a bacon sarnie and looked a few things while we waited for Alice to join us. 

We met her by her tractors, and I got a photo on one :)  , then an ice-cream - perhaps my first En femme public ice-cream #milestone  

Then we did the inside bit with the modelling section, some nice Mechano in there. 

Alice fancied a beer, and I had a 0% beer one from the tent and we sat on a table for a bit. It was sunny but not too warm as there was a bit of a breeze

There were quite a few Morris Minors for me to look at, but they were all mostly newer than mine and not of much interest to me. We watched them parade the miniature steam engines. 

It was getting towards 1pm and both myself and Lexi wanted to head home, so we wandered towards
the exit looking at a few things on the way. 

I said my goodbyes and prepared to get on my way.

Then my troubles started - she didn't start that well, and there was a metallic noise while running that shouldn't have been there. So I just moved her to a different car parking row and put the bonnet up to check.  Lexi drove past and asked if I was OK, and I foolishly said I was.

Turns out I wasn't - I thought it was coming from the starter motor, so I turned her off, whacked it a few times with a big wrench as I though it was stuck on. But when I came to restart it just span and didn't engage at all. So I ended up crawling under the car in my dress to take the starter off.

A chap offered assistance, but I thought I had solved it - but then realised I hadn't.

Messaged Alice to see if she could come and assist, and decided it was best to leave it off , get her running and pray it didn't stall on the way home.  We did try the starting handle, but it wasn't easy. We also tried a push start, with me jumping in at the last minute, but it was a rutted gravel track, and didn't work. Some chap took pity on us and offered a tow start, which did work thankfully.

I got most of the way home, then it died at a junction 1.8 miles away. Luckily there was a Irish , possibly traveller couple in a motorhome in a layby just by it. 

They were a bit scary, but helpful and gave me a push start -  it was on tarmac and with two of them it worked much better.

I got home rather flustered , but I got home :)

 

Leeds Pride Weekend

I started this a few days after the weekend as I had been suffering from quite bad post event comedown. I had a lovely video call with a friend on the Wednesday night and chatted to a few other friends on Instagram too which really seemed to help though.  

It's always quite jarring to go from a few days dressed, back to being treated as the male me. Not sure if it was just that it was such a good weekend that it's been worse. I was also quite tired from it all I guess.

I'm going to skip the full on adventure description this time, I will summarise the other days at the end for record keeping purposes. But for context:

• Thursday Night :  Trans-Wakefield, overnight stay in Wakefield (Holiday Inn Express)
• Friday : Leeds First Friday Social, staying at the Marriot until Monday
• Saturday : Leeds shopping / adventures , evening drinks
• Sunday : Leeds pride parade / after party
• Monday: Return home 

The main event  - Sunday Leeds Pride :

I walked in the Wakefield pride last year, I had watched Manchester's big parade too last year, but I had
not walked in a big one before this weekend. I had been off the dancing juice most of the weekend to ensure I felt really good for Sunday, for me the main point of the weekend was to enjoy the parade.

My friend Arabella had assisted me in the morning with medical tape to create a very convincing illusion of cleavage, so I ended up wearing a secondary dress choice due to it having a lower cut than my original choice.

My shoe choice seemed sensible, but I had failed to break them in, so it didn't go well, but they looked really nice. 

I was considering going with my real hair, but I chickened out and put my silver wig on. I just wanted to look my absolute best, and it's my favourite look.

Most of my friends were in the Marriot, and I arranged to meet up with Alice and Rebeka outside at
1:30pm , we needed to assemble at 1:45pm , and would be walking shortly after 2pm.  Alice had gone with a wedding dress, and had a fab trans umbrella, she always looks amazing. 

Our group was told to meet on Great George Street by the 'Be at One' bar. We seemed to spend quite a while gathering, and shuffling around a bit, we had ended up a bit further back than we should have been.  

I Chatted to a few friends, and I spotted the Trans-Wakefield group a bit further behind so I went and said a brief hello to them.

I think it was around 2:20 when we started to move off, we went down the side of the art gallery and turned left onto the headrow. The crowds were huge, packed all along both sides, I felt very humbled to be there.  I was waving my flag around, trying not to bash anyone.  I mainly kept towards the centre, so didn't do much hive-fiving, didn't feel quite confident to start doing that.

I did feel very happy to be involved, and it was fantastic to see how much support there was. Great to
be experiencing it with my friends too. I did take some photo's and video, but was trying to stay in the moment as much as I could. 

It was quite a long route, I think it was past 3pm before we got to the freedom quarter.  My feet were pretty sore, I took a lot of skin off them, they still have deep gouges a week later !

After we arrived back at the freedom quarter, we visited a few of the stands, but soon decided it would be better if we went and found a straight pub to sit in, as everywhere would be rammed.  So we went to the Bankers Cat. 

A few of the girls who hadn't got a place on the march met us there, so we ended up taking over quite a few seats.  We have a few in there, and then headed over the road to 'Tapped' because they also do fab beer, but also pizza !

As it got later we seemed to fragment into different mini groups, and I headed off with Arabella and Benni back to the freedom quarter.

Benni left after an hour or so to catch her train back, and we ended up trying a cocktail place before calling it a night.  We were not really out that late, but it was a tiring day and neither of us really wanted to get very drunk.

A brief  mention of the rest of the weekend :

Thursday:

My parents in law were visiting early Friday, which meant I could not easily escape to Leeds, so I ended up getting a cheap room in Wakefield at the Holiday Inn Express/ 

I went to the trans-Wakefield group at the 'Our House' café as normal, then met up with Ann in the New Union - she had also decided to come up early. 

It was a nice evening, had a good chat with a few people, and nice to catch up with Ann again.

Friday: 

It was largely spent with Ann and Benni. It was Flamingo's for lunch , some time in Tapped in the afternoon. 

I was wigless, and in a black and white wrap dress. I had only taken my silver wig this time. 

We ate tapas at Revolution De Cuba in the early evening.  Then headed back to the hotel to change. I had a teal dress, and matching shoes on. I did end up changing the shoes as they were not that comfy !

We spent some time in Fibre, which had the penthouse reserved for us all. Then met up with Alice and the gang in the Bridge, the Packhorse and finally Northern Guitar. 

I was taking it very steady to ensure I didn't feel ill over the weekend - so didn't really drink much.

Saturday:

Mainly with Arabella and Benni.  I took Arabella for a visit to the armouries in the morning, then met up with Benni towards lunch time.

We did some shopping, then the LGBTQ stalls at the museum. We had cake at an LGBTQ event at the Age UK building.  

For our evening meal we ate at Pieminster. The pies were gorgeous - it was really slow service though.

In the evening we headed to the Viaduct Showbar, we paid to get in - they had converted the road outside to an event space, with a stage and bars and covered areas. It was really fun, we did lots of dancing. 

Arabella had helped my tape my chest up, so I had a cleavage, which I was very pleased with indeed :)

We ended the night with a visit to some cocktail places outside the freedom quarter.

Monday:

My feet were ruined, and so I was not best pleased when my car fob didn't work, which meant a walk to Poundland for a new battery.  

Thankfully I could still get in with a key to dump my bags in it - but it did set the alarm off doing it that way.

I was in man mode, as I had originally planned to pop to my parents to see them on the way home, but it would have been near enough lunch time when I arrived, so decided to do it another day.

Aside from that it was a good journey back home.  I managed to get out and cut the front lawn, but didn't' get much done for the rest of the day. 

 

Two Coasts, Four days, Six dresses

The school summer holidays started on the 21st of July for us, I had booked a static caravan for a week at a nice site in Hunstanton, Norfolk. The park is Searles, we had stayed there previously a few years ago and loved it. 

With the additional room available in the wife's new car, it was the first holiday where there would be room for additional bags of female attire and the vast array of makeup and shoes required for some en-femme days.

The holiday itself was really good, we did an amphibius seal tour on the sandbanks around Hunstanton, a narrow gauge railway ride to a holy village, and a ride in an army truck around a military museum - as well as the usual beach days, over eating and drinking too much of the local beer.

En-femme in King's Lynn 

I only managed one en-femme day in the end, that was on the Sunday. It was only my third time out with the family. 

We headed into Kings Lynn arriving just after midday.

I chose to wear a vintage 80's 'Mollie Haw' dress, it was suitably summery and nice and light fabric. 

On arrival we found a café and had a drink. Then we did the museum, then popped into Boots as we both needed something. 

Then we started looking for food places, and ended up in a pub. I had a really nice pork belly roast.

After this we had a 5 minute look around inside the cathedral, then onwards to the docks. They have some kind of mammoth trail thing going on, so I got a photo next to that too.

We then popped into Costa for a drink before heading home. We were wandering around for about three hours in total. 

It mainly went well , both kids called me dad once, and my wife asked one of the them to double check what 'daddy' wanted while she stood at the bar in the pub. But given it's not a regular occurrence they all did really well.

I am always a bit worried about getting negative reactions while out with my family, if I'm on my own I only have myself to defend - or more likely just laugh off, or get myself away from it. I do feel more conscious of the potential for my loved ones to be upset, and feel guilty about this.

We didn't seem to get any that I noticed thankfully. 

After we got back to the caravan park, I headed out alone to the beach - I had dreamt of doing so for a long time. I had a bit of a paddle and took some video's of me messing around for Insta. It was fun !

The wind was not fun with my wig, and some of the other photo's I took didn't turn out so well.

Blackpool - Friday

We returned from our holiday on the Thursday night, which meant that I then had a free weekend to do some more en-femme adventures !

I had four options, Hull Pride, Nottingham Pride, the 'Seasiders' meeting at Bridlington, and also 'Blackpool Chix'. I chose the later, I knew people at most of them, but I had been itching to do Blackpool for a while.  I had heard many good things about it.

On the Friday they meet up at the Dragon Fly BnB at 8pm, and on the Saturday it's LuLu's at 8pm.

I found a cheap BnB online, which was very near both meeting points and booked that. It was a gay friendly place, as it seems a lot are around that area : https://www.habberlyhotelblackpool.co.uk/

Turns out the owner had been on "Four in a bed" , the hotel review program ! - but at his previous hotel.

I set off around midday, stopping to charge at Birch services around 2pm, and arriving at just before 4pm.  I had a sandwich at Birch. Got booked into the hotel, and carted my bags up 3 flights of stairs to the attic room I had booked.  It was very cosy ! - the loo/shower was a shared private room one flight down, just for the two attic rooms.  It had a Velux window, and I could see the sea if I poked my head out 😁 - I did have a sink at least. 

The event didn't start until 8pm, so I did some wandering up and down the front, got some photos, and then found a café where I had a jacket potato.  My digestive system wasn't very happy, too much beer over the previous week I think.

I headed back to the hotel and got changed for the evening. I was feeling a bit bloated, so went with my Shein summer dress which is quite forgiving around the waist. Had really nice comments the previous time I wore it out too. 

I walked the short distance to the Dragon Fly and had to wait a short while until someone came to answer the door bell, as the inner door was locked.

Once inside I was directed to the bar where I found a few of the other girls. I had known that Justine would be there, so there was once friendly face. But was soon talking to a
number of others too. It and the next venue were cash only bars, fortunately I did have a £10 note on me for emergencies !

We headed to LuLu's next , which is more of a proper LGBTQ+ cabaret bar, but also a hotel too, rather than a BnB.  It has a DJ and is much bigger downstairs. 

We spent a while in there, then headed to Galleon, which is a straight music bar - really nice in there. They had a live band on, and we met up with some women who were on a 50th birthday weekend. They were quite tipsy but very friendly and lovely. 

There was some fab decor in here too - the downstairs loo was through a Tardis door !!  - and there was
all sorts of Dr Who memorabilia inside.

After this we went to the Flying Handbag which is an LGBTQ+ venue , very big, air conditioned with a drag host . It had a pool table, big dancefloor and quite a lot of seating. We got in for free with out Blackpool Chix card too ! - saving us the princely sum of £2.

I decided to call it a night after midnight, I had been on soft drinks to try and help with my digestive issues, and also wanted to try to be fresh for the next day which was really more the main event. Alas this was not to be.

Blackpool - Saturday day time

I had not had a good night, there was heavy rain at 2am which on the Velux was really loud and woke
me.  Then at just after 4am a guy who had the other attic room arrived back, and fell asleep on his bed with his light on and door open.  He had somehow managed to set an alarm on his phone which was really really loud and woke me up.  

Unfortunately he was so absolutely hammered it didn't wake him, and it kept stopping, then going off again every 10 minutes.  So I chucked a dress on and went next door and shook him till he woke up - he did attempt to turn it off, and apologised 'sorry mate' - but he clearly failed as it continued to go off for another 30 mins. 

I didn't want to interact with him any more in the state he was in, so I just shut his door and put my emergency earplug in - I carry one in my purse for loud clubs, one ear buzzes when music gets too loud.

I did manage to get back to sleep, but he had clearly set an alarm for 7am too, an hour before I wanted to get up. I just got up at 7 and had my shower. It was still going off an hour later when I finished putting my makeup on.

I had my breakfast, but didn't feel too great after it.  I met up with Justine who was eating breakfast at a café just over the road and had a tea in there while she ate hers.  Then we headed towards the shops and met up with the two other girls, Stephanie and Catriona. We did a bit of shopping, and we had a drink at a coffee shop.

Catriona decided to go have a sleep, and the three of us did some charity shops for a few hours. I really wasn't feeling too good at all, so I decided I would also go for a lay down. 

Hadn't had any lunch yet, and some pills I got from Superdrug said they needed to be eaten after food, so I went to Sainsburys and got a ploughman's sandwich and some ginger tea.  I spend the rest of the afternoon napping.  

Blackpool - Saturday Night

I really wasn't sure if I was going to feel well enough to go out, but a message from a friend
Arabella who actually lives in Blackpool and wanted to meet up pushed me to make a decision and I got ready and gave them a call to arrange meeting with them too.

Really glad I did, it was a fab night in the end.

We met at LuLu's , spend quite a while in there. There were a few more girls, perhaps 10 of us in total. After this we went to Galleon's again, it was much much busier, and we were standing for a while.

There was a couple of bands on, who were really good. We eventually managed to steal an entire corner of the bar and a few tables to make our own trans area 😂

The tipsy 50th party women from the previous night turned up, and one of them was being very entertaining again.  A lovely CIS girl ended up being our official photographer and took quite a few group shots of us all, none of which I have yet though.  She even lost her seat in the process which seemed a little unfair.

Arabella met us in there, and we had a bit of a catchup in between people trying to flirt with her 😂

There was also another fairly drunk young couple who wanted us to dance. She was very keen to tell me how inclusive they were bringing up her kids, and that she saw us as women, and was very complimentary about our look.  They were both nice, but a bit handsy ! 

We were in there quite a while, but eventually a number of us decided to head to the Flying Handbag. Me and Arabella joined them.  We spent another hour in the handbag, did a bit of dancing. Arabella headed home and soon it was just three of us left at about 1am.

This ended up with just me and Emily, who decided we should try a very 'down to earth' bar before heading back to our respective hotels. It was called 'Garlands'  - it had a drag DJ , flags and such. 

The clientele were a little rough looking, and some were very worse for wear.  We ended up on a table with some lovely older CIS couple who had been out drinking and had a bad experience in another bar with an aggressive drunk lady.  They offered some seats to us as we were standing at the bar. Emily wowed them with some slight of hand magic which they found amazing.  

A fairly old guy with came in, with an even older guy with a walking stick - he looked very frail. They ended up getting a table next to us.  The really old guy seemed to be shuffling closer and closer to me on the bench seat, the couple I think spotted this and moved to give me a bit more room. I thought he was going to end up in my lap at one point. It was a bit strange.  I was half expecting to be groped when I left, but he didn't.

I waked back towards LuLu's with Emily, and we passed some very dodgy looking characters, who I wouldn't have wanted to meet on my own for sure !  We got a comment 'Fuckin ell'  not sure if it was an insult, or compliment, but didn't stop to find out.

We parted ways at the pedestrian crossing which took me over the road to my hotel. I think I met her at Nottingham Invasion last year - it was the slight of hand magic that made me twig. She did some coin tricks in the pub next to the shopping centre.

Sunday 

I had to be out by 10am, I got down to breakfast at 9am and had the place to myself with the two partners serving / cooking for me.  Felt hungry so did manage to eat more than the previous day.

Journey back was nicer, I did it in about 2:30 , charging once at the Rivington services on the M61

It seems to be a new tradition that I pop into the local shop while still dressed from an adventure, so I did Asda too !

Feeling a bit better today, but still quite tired.

Summary 

All in all, a fab couple of nights, was great to meet and get to know more people, I will definitely try to get back to more of them. It's so much cheaper than Leeds or Manchester too. 

Definitely one to do if budget is the primary concern. The drive there and back isn't fun - but it's doable. The train might even be an option !

The bars are more like the ones I love in Manchester, but just spread out a bit more. 

It doesn't feel as safe as either Leeds or Manchester, it's a much more deprived area, so I wouldn't want to be walking back to my BnB in a bad state on my own for sure.

Was great to be able to visit both coasts En-Femme for the first time too, and in the same week !  Didn't get to paddle in the sea at Blackpool though, I will have to do that next time.