COMIC RELIEF TAKES ANDORRA

It's worth mentioning first why we were doing our thing for Comic Relief. Our housemate, Rache, was a choreographer for a Comic Relief Fashion Show. She wanted our support for this, and also wanted Russ to appear. Yes, she wanted Russ to be a catwalk model. It's all in the bone structure, darling.

Unfortunately, we were away while it was on, so we had to create our own small contribution. We saw some Comic Relief pants advertised for 5 quid, a pound of which went to the charity. We decided to make our own and give five pounds to charity. We spent sixty seconds designing them and thirty minutes to write in marker pens - possibly we could have done with more time. Our original plans were to wear them on the slopes, but after our mate Ben's comment that we'd never talk to any women during the holiday, a gauntlet was laid down. And in the words of Marty McFly, NO-ONE calls us chickens.

They first saw light on the journey to Andorra. Glenn used all of his charm to convince a stewardess on our flight that it was in a good cause to be seen with them, thus proving that people will do the most illogical things if the word charity is bandied about. They also came out on the baggage carousel at Toulouse (the only things that did for 40 minutes).

On the day itself, Friday 16th March, we set off for the slopes wearing a fetching combo of waterproofs and large pants - a taster for old age. We got a few comments of "Nice Pants" and a "Fair play to yous" from the Irish guy who took our picture at the top of the slope. Glenn also left his mark on the slopes, as the black pen rubbed off on the snow. But we had bigger plans for the pants - oh yes.

During the afternoon the weather closed in and we were left in our hotel room. As a side-bet, Glenn volunteered to do something silly. Sillier, I mean. Thus for no apparent reason he wore all his clothes. Cabin fever can do strange things to a man.

That evening kicked off with a Mexican evening organised by our tour company. The only Mexican thing was the tequila poured over the ice-cream. Sorry, but roast chicken isn't a Mexican dish - my mum's Irish, and she's cooked it for years. Maybe that's why it's always burnt. Shit, I can never go home again. To salvage the meal, we laid into the red wine, a move which would have repercussions during the following event, a two hour free bar (price ten pounds). To students (Rob, Russ) and alcoholics (Glenn) like us, the words "Free Bar" are like George Best - full of beer, should be brilliant but liable to end in disaster. Russ and Glenn had pairs of pants in their pockets, showing their Boy Scout preparedness.

During the session, Russ and Dave were coerced into entering a bar-top game. Actually, Dave was persuaded by a good looking barmaid and Russ was so pissed he'd have volunteered for a firing squad. Glenn and Rob prepared to laugh at their expense, until the game was revealed. Our two intrepid volunteers were required to put their hands on their head while young women from the crowd pushed ice-cubes up the inside of their trouser legs and down the other side. The sound of Rob and Glenn turning green was drowned out by the cheers of Russ and partner winning the competition. In an entirely uncharacteristic mishap, Russ' victory dance took out four drinks.

By now, we were fairly well oiled, so the time for the pants had arrived. While Russ got to know Jo better, the boys with their mind on the job blazed a trail of flashbulbs and T J Hughes underwear. The procedure was simple - find a woman, fall to knees, ask her to wear the pants, point and click. By the end Rob and Glenn had it down to a fine art. There was even room for branching out - we even took pictures of blokes as well. Some people offered to show us their pants, but we explained that we weren't after that sort of photo. In hindsight, that may have been a mistake.

Once the free bar had died out, we moved down the street to the Bilbord nightclub. We even had to send Russ back to the room to get the remaining pants, as some had disappeared. How you lose a pair of large men's Y-fronts with "Comic Relief" on it is hard to comprehend, but we had booze on our side. Anyway, the club produced a rich vein of form, with afro wigs also circulating. It was like a spirits-fueled Mr. Ben. Have a look at the full collection of photos at the Pants Pictures page.

That was the story of our Comic Relief.
Money to charity - twenty squids.
Photos taken - 50.
Pants lost - 3 (including one to queen of the beer steals Lucy)
Night out - priceless.