Today is what me and my friend Mat have been referring to as ‘Game Day’. Despite the title its not a day where we shoot pheasant, or get involved in the West Baltimore drugs system. Instead its a day where after work, Mat comes round and all we do for hours is play games. Layla loves these days. She loves the way that we entirely take over the TV and shout offensive words at it as we shoot the living shoot out of virtual things. She loves that I completely ignore anything she’s saying because I am focusing on hitting Mat with a ultra-super combo in his stupid computer face. She could be telling me that everyone outside of our flat is dead and it would go fairly unnoticed until we’ve at least beaten the 2nd level boss. Oh sorry, did I say love? I meant loathe. Game Day is long overdue though. The last time it happened our cats chased a squirrel through our house until it managed to climb underneath the bathtub through a tiny crack in the wall. There is no window in our bathroom so the squirrel in search for freedom had essentially made itself a prisoner of a nicely tiled jail. We called the RSPCA and they said they were unable to do anything because it was a grey squirrel and as they are not native animals they can’t be touched. The RSPCA are racists. If you ever see a giraffe crippled in the middle of Oxford Circus you’ll just have to help it yourself, as calling the RSPCA would just mean they turn up, tell the giraffe to go back to where it bloody came from then spit at it and call it unfair names like ‘long necked bastard’ and ‘leaf eating twat’.
So we tried various things including leaving a tiny trail of rice crispies from the hole in our bath all the way to window. This would probably have worked ok if I hadn’t forgotten about them 10 minutes later and trod rice crispies everywhere. In the end we left the lights of in the bathroom hoping it would just come out by itself. For 6 days the squirrel scrabbled about underneath our bath which made it very disconcerting to shower. Then we gave in, and got a plumber round to remove the bath panel. We were expecting that as the bath panel was removed our rodent squatter would depart in a flash but instead he was nowhere to be found. The little bastard. There was no where he could go and so he must have simply evaporated. I was worried perhaps the shower had been too hot and he had melted. Either way he cost us a new bath panel, a handful of rice crispies and Game Day. Next squirrel I see I’m going to fine him.
Today’s game day, rather excitedly, will be Resident Evil 5 based. I have only played the demo of this which helped me get through snowy times as stated here:
http://tiernandouieb.blogspot.com/2009/02/against-odds.html
But Mat is bringing over the proper full game tonight which means there will be some genuine fear happening. Its still one of the only three things I have ever screamed because of. I’m not really a screaming person, but there has been cause for it a few times. One was seeing the show The Witching Hour at Edinburgh two years ago, that was petrifying, and caused me to leap into my friend Ali’s lap out of sheer fear and then drink a lot of whisky afterwards. Two was on the Big Shot ride at the Stratosphere in Vegas when I was fairly certain I was being sent to the moon. The third time was on Resident Evil 3: Nemises when me and Mat played it in our first year of university. We had been drinking some cans of beer and were a little way through the game, when there was the in-game sound of breaking glass. We paused the game and had a moment discussing what the hell that noise might be. After a deep breath the game was unpaused. Walking along the corridor nothing seemed to happen. Then we arrived at the staircase. Now in the old games the stairs were shown with images of each step as you walk down them at a time with nothing else in vision, which is really unfair. The stairs were a terrible experience. As we reached the bottom, still nothing happened. Big sigh of relief. Then we took one step forward AND A 12 FOOT ZOMBIE BROKE THROUGH THE WINDOW AND HIT US IN THE FACE! Game paused, we both screamed. I still have nightmares about that. Terrible stuff.
Anyone that mocks Resident Evil’s level of scariness is either super tough or has never played it. Its truly wrong. As far as I know its still the only thing to scare my friend Omar. He’s 6’6″ and does ninjitsu. Very little phases him. However he once played Resident Evil 2 and his friend knocked on his door in the middle of game play and he jumped. That’s how scary it is. So tonight with RE5 may cause me a heart attack. Cant imagine Layla would love that. Cant watch TV, the sofa is taken and I’ve had a heart attack and died. Well she’ll just have to deal with it because its Game Day.
Had a bit of a lovely gig in Norwich last night. Aside from the fact that the gig was in a tiny lovely place and I met another Twitterer, Sorrel, who was ace, there were two incidents which made the evening. One was sitting outside the Tesco Metro in town having a sandwich with two of the other acts, Alistair Greaves and Nathanial Metcalfe, when a man in a top hat, tails and carrying a cane strolled by. It was as though he had fallen in from a Victorian day. It was at that point Nat pointed out that the road we were on was called ‘Gentlemen’s Walk’. Amazing. I expect next time I walk down a street near me called Victoria Road for it to be filled with people in period costume. Either that or a massive train station or a dead queen. The other incident was a women at the end of the night coming to say that she enjoyed the show but she happened to speak with a voice like a Muppet. I don’t know if she’d ever noticed this before but it was almost exactly how Kermit would sound if he lived in Norwich. I had to stifle my childish laughter, but it was hilarious. I wonder if its hindered her in life or just cheered up everyone around her. I can do a half decent Kermit impression and some people tell me how happy that makes them feel. I like to think that this Muppet woman is bringing cheer to the world. Even though she has probably never been taken seriously by anyone ever. She could be telling you everyone outside of your flat is dead and you’d just laugh. Then you’d wonder how she got in your flat.
