Ian Coates

Last updated 11:22, Thursday, 27 November 2008

I’ve always fancied being a male model. I’m still waiting for the call from one of the top agencies, but I suspect unless Airfix or Hornby get on the phone I have little chance.

In reality I’ve never managed to adhere to the code of dressing very well.

I can cut a dash with the best of them when wearing glad rags for a night at some posh do, but I’m more comfortable in jeans and wellies.

I never quite got the fashion industry. Half the time the ladies on the catwalks of Milan or Paris look a little too freaky in their outfits for me to want to take them out round here.

Some cynics among you may point out that such high class ladies might not want to go out with me to the pub in Shap. That’s probably true, but only because the frocks they wear are hardly suited to the slightly chilly breezes we get up here.

Anyway that only happens when the pub door is left open.

My dress sense has often been mocked, usually when my appearance has not conformed to the fashions of the time.

Several years ago it became the trend to wear a shirt out of your trousers.

No one told me.

The inventors of this rule never broadcast it to my TV or paper and I had been the product of a nagging mother for 20 odd years to tuck in my shirt.

Perhaps I have the response times of an ocean-going oil tanker, but the message finally got through and then they change the rules!

To that end I am not a follower of fashion but a trendsetter.

I think someone from the fashion houses needs my phone number for a few ideas.

Alas my body shape may need a little honing to achieve a more sellable quality.

They could fly me out to the States to star in a few commercials. I could be the next big thing in New York.