Dawn of the Red (Paint)

That's right boys and girls, this week sees the return of the infamous CATCOUK bad puns!

Immediatly after completing last week's post, I rushed down stairs, jumped into my beautiful Mark IV Escort, and raced to Lancing with my mother for... a family BBQ! What more fun could you want? All of the usual family BBQ shenanegans (if that's spelt right) - family members making snide remarks at each other, lots of charcoaled burgers, and of course, all of those great photos from America... yawn.

But fortunatly, I had an excuse to leave early from this particular family event. I had to take Ernie on his first long drive, to London, with my friend Siobhan, and her sister and one of her friends. We were going to their Grandparents place to stay over night, in preparation for the next morning. Because at 8am the next day (bank holiday Monday), we were going to need to be in Leicester Square, taking part in a world record breaking attempt.

Now I know what you're thinking. A man of such calibre as myself will be taking part in some almighty record breaking attempt that will benefit the good of all mankind. What will it be? Breaking a new land speed record in Ernie; Setting new record for the lowest ever base jump; developing a cure for some horrible disease, in record breaking time? No. In fact, we were helping in an attempt to set a new record for the largest number of walking zombies gathered together in one place.

Yep, I know. It was an interesting day...

First, we all got up at 6am, had a quick breakfast, and then on with the make-up and costumes. I went for a rather basic ensemble, inpsired by Shaun of the Dead. An old shirt, and some older trousers that looked reasonably neat. I suppose I could have been an office worker. With the basic clothes sorted, it was time for some make-up. Now, all jokes aside, I don't know one flippin' thing about make-up.

So as I'm sure you can imagine, my white face paint was rather lacking. In some places, my face was as white as one of those mimes. In other places, I wasn't white at all! Never the less, Maddi, Siobhan's sister, applied some slightly better make-up (and by slightly, I mean amazing), and the look was a complete. I think my face ended up looking like a lame circus clown. Well, a circus clown that had been beaten up. My big red lips didn't help either (signs that I was not 100% well, and may come down with a cold). To finish off, I wiped a load of read paint (see the pun in the title now) on my shirt, and it all looked like blood. Lovely.

Send in the clowns - I think they already did, into a bar brawl...

So anyways, being the case that women were in charge, we were naturally half an hour late arriving. Not that it mattered, the count didn't start until just after 9. To count us all, we had to get a raffle ticket. Well, first person we saw was this woman. So, all of us 'Zombies' started lurching towards her. As I write this, I am chuckling to myself. To understand why, please imagine yourself as this young lady. One of your friends probably came up to you at the pub the other night, and said something like 'we're attempting to break a world record tommorrow, would you lend us a hand, and give out some raffle tickets?' And now, on this beautiful August bank holiday morning, you have nearly 700 'Zombies' lurching towards you.

As we're all putting bloodied hands in to grad a raffle ticket, this young lady is looking particularly scared. As I take my tocket, she says in an uneasy voice 'Er.. this would probably be easier if I wasn't so scared of Zombies...'

Anyways, the Zombie walk/ meet was a hoot. We didn't break the record, but the morning did involve such classics as: that wedding cracker, Zombie Conga; the disco-tastic Zombie Hokey-Cokey; kids classic, Hot-Potato (well Hot-Fake-Guts really); the old family favourite, Zombie three legged race; and the ever popular, 'How many Zombies can you fit in a Phone Box?'. After that, we walked around Leciester Square, and bombarded all the local shops and terrorised them. Marvellous.

Obviously, we were quite an unusual site. At many times during the day, we had to pose for tourists. One particular encounter I remember (and will probably need to bring up at a 'session' in the future) was a couple of American guys. We were sitting on a bench, and these two yanks walked up to us. We chatted for a while, and then he asked if he could have a photo taken with us. So someone decided it would be best if he lied accross us. I believe the girls were hoping that we would be sitting on their laps (apparently he was good looking, although I didn't see it).

And he did start his lie down by sitting on someone's lap. Mine. One of my hands was trapped between one of his legs, and someone's boob (at least half good, although it was the back of my hand on the boob - no chance of copping a feel). The other was behind me somewhere. All the girls thought he was great, but he could have sat down on any of three lovely young lady's laps, but chose me. A friggin bloke! What does that tell ya?

Anyways, after that, we proceeded to Camden Lock on the tube. For some reason, all the people on the underground were giving us funny looks. I can't work out why.

Well that was the highlight of my week. I'm now going to get some sleep before starting my new job at Chesswood Middle School as a Teaching Asst. See y'all next week.

If you think that me dressing up as a Zombie is daft, why not leave a comment telling me that I'm a dullard.

If you think it was good to see me 'letting my hair down' why not leave me a comment, telling me how to get fake blood stains out of the upholstery of my car...

Quote of the Week: 'Can I have a photo with you' aksed the 15th Japanese tourist of the day, wanting their picture taken with us.

Song of the Month: Worried about Ray. Hoosiers.