my life as a artist
balloons
Friday 2nd March 2007 2:32 PM
Many people (OK then, three) have asked me what ever happened to my burgeoning career as a balloon modeller. For a period of nine months in 2004 I received many prestigious engagements in the guise of Bertie Bubblesqueak, balloon modeller to the stars. I had been initiated into this esoteric art during my relationship with the very beautiful and mysterious children's entertainer, Beattie Bunnikins. Under the tagline ' I go squeak in the presence of Beattie' I blazed a trail of balloon modelling excellence through the salons of Paris and Vienna, my dexterity and audacious innovations drawing gasps of amazement from the august clientele.
Towards the end of this period my repertoire had expanded to the point where I was capable of doing dogs and swords and worms. In the dog section I had learnt to do twenty four different types of terrier, covering the alphabet from Airedale to Yorkshire. In the sword section I could range from the Viking broadsword to the terrifyingly sharp scimitar and I could do the worms sleeping, hypnotised or stone dead.
I had refrained from doing elephants after an unfortunate gig in rural North Yorkshire when four of the balloon elephants escaped . Ballon animals breed very quickly and in no time at all there were herds of balloon elephants rampaging across the countryside, trampling the crops and scaring the unimaginative.
The end came in November of 2004 after I. bought a batch of rogue balloons from a dodgy warehouse in Leeds. Two out of three of the balloons were 'poppers', as we call them in the trade, i.e. balloons that explode during the modelling process. After a particularly traumatic gig in a school hall in Easingwold, I got taken to the local military hospital suffering the effects of shell shock. Even though I made a full recovery, even now, If I'm walking down the street and a mortar shell explodes behind me, I worry that it's a balloon popping.
People still ask me to perform my latex miracles but I prefer to live with my priceless memories. Perhaps the memory that lingers longest is the look on Prince Philip's face as I unveiled my special tableau of a Scottish wire-haired terrier attacking a sleeping worm with a Viking broadsword……. but after such a serious illness I had to make some hard decisions. Did I want a life that was a whirl of glamour, meaningless sex and cocaine or did I want to be a balloon modeller?
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