An Informative Look At
Written By Edgar Dalton
aaAAaarrRRGGH!
What's the matter?
You! Looking like that! I've never seen anything like it. Well not since Miss Armitage got us to express ourselves freely at pre-school play group with beakers of poster paint and papier maché.
Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to startle you.
But you're covered head to foot in the most disgusting mess imaginable. Look, it's dripping off you everywhere.
Yes, I'm just on the way to the shower.
There's custard all over your face, your hair is plastered with baked beans, and there appears to be enough semolina down the front of your chest for dinners at a medium-sized Comprehensive.
There can't be. They said it was tapioca. Yes [lick, lick], it's definitely tapioca.
And to make matters worse you're not wearing any clothes.
Yes I am. I'm decently attired in a pair of designer underpants.
Oh so you are. But they're soaked in ...in...
Black treacle?
...and clinging to your...your...
Manly form?
..and filled to overflowing with what for all the world looks like Yorkshire Pudding batter.
I know. Weren't they little tinkers!
Who?
My friends in there, -S.L.O.S.H..
What's S.L.O.S.H.?
The Society for Lovers Of Slapstick Happenings. We're having a get-together, and I've just had my initiation.
Hang on, hang on. I can't take this all in. One thing at a time. What's slapstick?
Well for us in S.L.O.S.H. it means having a great time with food or paint or mud or oil. Anything messy. Getting into a mess with sticky things, -together or alone, -for fun.
And S.L.O.S.H. is a club?
Yes.
And who can join?
Any adult man whose idea of bliss is a bucketful of wallpaper paste down the front of his trousers. Or somebody else's.
Are there many members?
We've got over 150 mostly in the UK but some in Europe and the States as well.
All into slapstick?
Well, many of them - some prefer other messes.
And all gay?
As queer as a dish of mushy peas and maple syrup (and before you ask that's what the mixture is trickling down my left thigh) -except for one or two who're straight or bi.
What age are they?
All ages. We've got students who're crazy for custard-pie fights and a couple of sprightly retirement-agers who like nothing better than a roll around in the mud on the Essex Marshes.
So not everyone just likes paste then?
Course not. We've got some who only like getting splattered with shaving foam, and others who're not satisfied by anything less than a wallow in a tub the size of Lake Windermere filled with flour and water mixture. (And that's nobody's business to get out of your crevices afterwards, I can tell you). Then there are some who prefer a gentle, mutual messing-up; while others are into role play and a bit of sub and dom, or even light bondage. We like to cover everything in S.L.O.S.H..
Er, yes. I think I see what you mean. So what does the club do?
Well it puts people in touch with one another for a start. There's a club magazine that comes out three times a year. There's a contact list on-line (available in hard copy for members who don't have web access). That's where everyone lists their particular turn-on, so members can meet up in private with like-minded messers for unimaginably filthy deeds. And pretty regularly we have occasions like this where the whole club is invited for a group session, with initiations, and games and so on. The club website even has a live message board.
Is that the room where all the laughter's coming from, interspersed with the occasional cry of 'No! No! Not the Raspberry Pavlova!'?
The very same.
Do you have to go through an initiation?
Oh no! Only if you want to. Some members just like to get others messed-up and not get messed-up themselves. And there are one or two who only like to watch, they just love seeing gloop getting poured over other member's heads and other member's bums and other member's ...er ...
Members?
...members.
And what else does S.L.O.S.H. do?
We have organised the mud-wrestling at London Pride, and lots of us took part.
I must say it looked great. I was half-tempted to join in.
You should have. And a group of S.L.O.S.H.ers were locked in a pillory at a gay charity event a while back and had paste chucked at them for hours on end.
Did a lot get raised?
I beg your pardon, young man? Oh, I see what you mean. Yes, a lot of money. And twice we've been asked to mud-wrestle on television, -in a programme called From Wimps To Warriors and also live on The James Whale Show. But we're not all raving exhibitionists. Some S.L.O.S.H.ers like to keep quite anonymous, and of course that's respected.
But what's uppermost in your mind when you're wrestling semi-naked in a pool of mud in front of a cheering audience?
The advancement of human dignity and propriety.
Really?
No! 'Phwoarrr! This is fuckinbrilliant!' more likely.
And would you say it was an attempt to make contact with the sensual side of our natures, to unlock the genetic memory of our ancestry in the primordial ooze?
No, it's usually an attempt to make contact with a plateful of trifle and UHT cream. You seem very interested in all this.
Me? No! Mind you, -I rememeber as a schoolboy watching Tiswas and waiting for the bit when the bloke in the stocks got baked beans over him. I used to like that. And even now I sometimes watch Noel Edmonds in the hope that it'll be a sexy young Dad who ends up in the gunge tank.
I see. So why not join us then?
Oh I couldn't. I've never done anything like that myself. Wouldn't I be prohibited for lack of experience?
No. The only thing S.L.O.S.H. prohibits is corny old jokes in its publicity material.
Quite right too. Well, I'd better let you get to your shower, you seem to have a plateful of banana custard in your left ear.
I'm sorry I can't hear you, I've got a plateful of banana custard in my left ear. Why not pop your head round the door and see if you want to join in?
But aren't I likely to get a pie in my face?
Well, -I can't give a cast-iron guarantee you won't. Go on, I can see you want to. In you go!
But I ...
[ Ssspplattt!]
...aaAAaarrggGGH!
If you're interested in ANY messy activity This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or join the club