This last weekend was the second (hopefully annual) Birmingham Comics Show. After not being able to get there for the first one last year it was a pleasure to be there this year.
The weekend started pleasantly enough with the usual jaunt down the motorway. All was clear and as neither Louise or Molly had decided to come to this cultural event, preferring the delights of a girly weekend instead, I was all alone and singing Duran Duran, The The and Cabaret Voltaire at the top of my lungs all the way down.
Yet again I stayed in the Etap on Great Colmore Street. In the promotional stuff it looks like this:
What they don't show you is the neighbourhood surrounding it. To the left you'll view the Romanesque vista that is the ruins of the Dome nightclub; Birmingham's first real superclub from many years ago. Over the road is a dodgy Irish private members club, an dodgy African restaurant, a dodgy Caribbean restaurant, a dodgy Greek restaurant, a dodgy Indian restaurant (you get the idea).
The whole neighbourhood feels like one of those places you only really feel comfortable driving through at speed. And smack in the middle of all this is the bright, blue neon embossed Etap hotel. The actual hotel is very bright, clean and fully functional.
The Etap is just fine. Once you're inside the place.
But getting inside is a problem. When you return from a night out there's a security guard on the door checking your room registration. This isn't normal for hotels as far as I can see. On asking about it last time we were told very matter of factly that they do have some problems with the guests getting a little worse for wear and various characters wandering in off the streets. Oh joy.
So. Leave Pocklington at 7, ready to leave hotel by 10.
But where oh where to go at that time of night..............................?
Oh don't be so daft - it's a comics convention.
There's bound to be a bar full of drunk comics folks.
And there was.
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