The B.G.O.

Saturday was a Big Gay Out. Kind of like a Big Day Out, but with showtunes.

Really, it was camper than christmas and gayer than the front row at a Liza gig.

The day started with the traditional gay Saturday morning ritual. Clutching head, simultaneously dying because of hangover (due to too many fancy cocktails the night before) and worrying about what to wear. A day at a lovely art museum was planned, but cycling would be involved. Trust me, it's difficult to decide what to wear when it's cold outside and all you've packed is a sailor sweater and capri pants.

Well, my wardrobe wasn't that limited to be honest, but it was suffering due to a thirty minute packing window and the fact that I was on the telephone whilst packing. Never a good idea.

Having selected suitable attire, the three of us bundle into the car and head northwards. Well, Eastwards. Well, towards the German border at least.

We have two i-pods to choose from and decide that we'd play from one on the way out and the other on the return journey. Suffice to say, neither was butch. And my Dutch Irish Friend did manage to pick out tracks by La Garland, Doris Day and Baccarat. He also managed to sneak in a couple of Eurovision tracks and a Bananarama classic too. As I say, not butch, not ever.

So we stroll around the museum, paying particular attention to the van Gogh's, the Seurat's and the lovely arms that one of the fellow visitors is displaying at the end of his lovely strong shoulders. Alas, they only sold postcards of the first two.

Having done the art, we then headed out to cycle around the national park in which the museum is situated. And rather than cycle the 2km back to the car (the direction we came in), we turned around twice, got giddy and got lost. We ended up cycling nearly 10km away from the car before we found a map. the fact that there were three car parks and three entrances to the park didn't help - especially as we had no idea which one we were parked at.

Bewitched, bothered and bedraggled, we found the car and found our way back to the Hague. Arriving home in time to gulp down a lovely bottle of Meursault and some champagne (I did say it was a big gay out), we neck our goats cheese salads and head out on the town.

Now the Hague and gay nightlife. Not really two words you'd put together, but you'd be surprised at how many gay bars there are in town. And you'd be surprised at how much they all look alike. I hope that the eggs, hoops, lambs and bunnies are all out for easter - if not, they have a funny idea of interior deco here.

We judged each of the bars (seven, count 'em, seven) out of ten, based on the quality of the deco, the quality of the patrons, the beer, the price and the general gayness. Nowhere really got above a five. Apart from one bar that got a six, but that was largely because Dennis was there.

At the bar where the old man kept staring at us, I was accosted on the way to the toilet by a handsome (in a beaten up, Rocky Balboa kind of way) guy called Marco. He wanted to know who I was, where I was from, did I like the bar, did I like the Hague. Pretty much chatting me up, I'd have said. But then he said "I'm not gay".

So he's not gay but he's in the worst of gay bars, where the only thing that could possibly make someone want to go in there would be the possibility of meeting other gay men. Hmm? Go figure.

"I'm not gay," he said "but I do like the gay men".

"Why's that?" said I.

"They buy me beers" he answered. Well I guess he's honest. 'Gay for pay' never really does it for me though, and so we moved on.

Having picked up a couple of hanger-onners along the way, we end up as a six-some leaving 'Stairs' at 2am. This is the only gay bar that is still open at this time, so we have to move on to somewhere that is - shock, horror - mixed. I know what this means.

Mixed never means bright young things, getting down to the latest choons. It never means cutting edge fashions and fabulous cocktails.

As I stood back and looked at the crowd of middle-aged men and women, dancing badly to really awful 'house' music, and necking beer after beer, I got a little wistful.

Sure, those gay bars had been pretty ropey. Sure, they had all been decorated by my grandmother. Sure, there were some dodgy characters in them.

But at that moment, I'd have quite happily swapped. Give me a seedy bar with showtunes over this lot any day.

That is, any seedy Den Haag gay bar except the one that smelled like a deep fat fryer.

That one, you could keep. No deal.