December 18, 2008

Who knows, exactly, what it was that attracted the admirer's attention?

The well-honed torso and narrowed waist?

The chiselled features? The mane of hair?

Swordsmanship; chivalry; his shhhomething-kind-of-ooh?

Who knows?

But what we do know, is that shortly after June 2005, when the Mystical Cherub-Eyed Newcomer of Prodigious Nature and Glaring Potential would burst onto the BCUK site with all the subtlety of Zorro screeching manically atop a wild Appalachian stallion's bare back, that LandersUK - having himself joined just a month earlier - would be there to greet him in much the manner of a hungry grizzly bear waiting to gorge himself on the anticipated up-river salmon.

Yes, that's right: He had his mouth wide open.

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He's been through many different guises since his hair-raising but to him joyful sexual pursuit of The Revered Wunderkind first began, of course.

Sometimes Adam, sometimes Paddy, sometimes something else - I can never remember which of the others I'm allowed to put publicly (and "butchered lover" is, still, not one of them).

But on and off he's always been Landers, and he has also, always, been Gay But Not Welsh.

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He's also always been something of a llwnt; and the Swashbuckling Anti-Hero of this very Secret Santa knows that, because they've been spent three years calling one another it. And frequently.

But where did they first cross swords words with one another?

Fear not: The Special One can remember.

It was when, as a blogging innocent, he'd accidentally copied and pasted some internet conspiracy nonsense about 9/11 that was doing the rounds at the time, and had been for years.

Landers daintily tip-toed down the steps from his ivory tower - like an ungainly fawn in oversized pink slippers, if you will - swished his ermine cloak behind his back, and declared in a comment that he was very "disappointed" in my The Talent's post.

(Have you ever heard a Brummie say "disappointed", btw? It's like a helicopter rotor blade slowly dying.)

He was, he simpered (and think Walter out of Dennis the Menace here) a little "concerned" that I'd such a divine thinker had bought into this blatant nonsense.

The Blog Author Of Dreams, magnanimous to the last and in a somewhat unusually handsome way, too, actually, in fact thought that was fair enough.

But of course at that time, he didn't realise Landers both came from outer space, and could cure everything with a potion of ground-up Battlefield Earth DVDs and some hard-core, underground, rampant Greek-style homosexualist verve.

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Then came The Bloscars - the most brilliant idea that he's had since he stopped wearing drag - have you ever seen a hairy bear in lipstick? - and not least because the board was swept that night by whom became known as The Blogger Of Esteem.

Truly, clouds parted and angels drifted from the sky that night to gently strum harps beside the multiple-award winner's slumbering head.

(Sadly, the awards would later become permanently tainted by the insistence of, well, others winning gongs instead. These are merely the whisperings heard in hallowed halls, however.)

To pay tribute and offer thanks, this Modest Blogger Of Shyness Personified sent Landers and his startlingly charming (by comparison) other half, Brad, some flowers of excellence.

"I just wanted to pay homage," he wrote in perfect ancient sanscript on the accompanying card.

Wrong choice of words, as it turned out.

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These days, of course, having decamped their merry selves to Galway, Landers and The Much Nicer One are not just Gay But Not Welsh, but Gay But Not Irish, too.

There, while Brad keeps them in sausages sandwiches - and one can only hope that's not a euphemism - Landers likes to occupy the time he spends away from caring for troubled minds and preventing them from abuse, by going online and bating rock-dwelling bloggers with troubled minds and encouraging their abuse.

As for his dogged - dogging? - pursuit of blog's Dashing Scarlet Pimpernel, who knows what or when that will ever occur?

For now, though, the Shadowy One asks me to pass one message to Sir Giddy of Galway:

"Tangerines in your sack again this year, sonny. Definitely no blood oranges."

Happy Christmas.

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