Our sextet of volunteers stepped out into a warm evening that brought out slightly more night time revellers and party people than usual. To be honest, it made for a rather calm and almost holiday-like atmosphere to the normal night economy. After setting out our wares for the evening, we were quite quickly approached by a couple of young men, curious (as ever) to know what we were about and why we do what we do...'Fair Play' was one of their responses followed by some encouraging conversation. Suffice to say they were grateful.
A wedding party were making their way through the City in dribs and drabs (presumably after the reception had finished). A couple and their little lad stopped by our table, and whilst husband duly went to sort out a pizza from The Millennium Chicken, his wife told us all they had been up to, every now and again having to put her hands over her child's ears as some raucous and expletive filled language would emanate from some group of lads on their way to further saturate their whistles! She said they wouldn't usually be out this late if it wasn't for attending the late reception. Her husband was a mite on the pedantic side when asking why we do what we do, which slightly intimidated some of our team. They were, however, very appreciative of our dedication and commitment.
We invited a passing bare-footed young lady to try a pair of our finest Primark flip flops, for which she expressed immense gratitude. We were graced with various donations from some insistant donors (which would come in very handy as one of our air pots had just stopped air-potting!! A mildly inebriated young lady from Wales (Aberdovey to be exact) visiting Lichfield was also very encouraging in her comments about our willingness to serve our community. One guy wanted to know if we wanted anything to eat... we told him we would be receiving chips later (a bit optimistic of us, as our regular lovely security doorman, Bobby, was away on hols with family). Nevertheless the Millenium Chicken boss did come out later on and to ask us if we wanted chips, to which we replied "is the Pope Catholic?" (no, we didn't really!) We expressed our thanks and quickly dispatched this potato delicacy.
The best smiley moment of the evening was watching two men resting their late night kebab meals on the barrier post that descends to let cars through, break into fits of laughter as they have to snatch their meals up as someone who is trying enter puts the code in and the barrier post rapidly starts moves downwards ...lol.
We are quite enjoying these warm evenings, you should come join us - we are a really friendly bunch!