The Diplomatic Corpse...

On Sunday night Steve, Stuart and I took part in street game / treasure hunt / murder mystery The Diplomatic Corpse.

There had been a murder at the Paudaguay Embassy and we were brought in to find out whodunit.

Run by A Door In A Wall the game consisted of seven missions where we had to go to addresses in and around Kings Cross, follow leads, solve clues, and interact with actors on the street to try and piece together the evidence. There were loads of inventive hiding places: posters in shop windows, messages on the street, mazes to navigate, graffiti to decode and puzzles to figure out.

Our team name - Pauda-guys - won the best team name prize and we did indeed work out who the murderer was. Sadly another team won the big prize though as they figured out more of the motives than we did.

Great fun if you like that sort of thing. Which we do!

A Door In A Wall: A Crime Of Fashion

On Sunday Stu, Oliver, Steve and I went on the latest A Door In A Wall murder mystery – A Crime Of Fashion – which was running in Shoreditch’s Boxpark in London’s not so glitzy East End.

We followed trails, we solved puzzles, we got wet. It was great fun. We discovered who the murderer was but sadly failed to win the top prize.

 Our team name was At Death's Dior (geddit??)

Apocalypse How?...

Last Sunday Oliver, Toby, Stu and I spent six hours combing the streets and building east London looking for a series of fiendish clues which required every drop of ingenuity and observation we possessed to solve. It was a treasure hunt murder mystery run by those lovely people at A Door In A Wall called Apocalypse How?

We loved it. Clever, funny, intriguing and frankly exhausting. What a great way to spend a Sunday. 

The pre-amble goes like this:- 20 years ago, Arthur Geddon crawled half-dead from the jungle; a miraculous survivor of a lost expedition. He clutched in his hands a series of stone tablets that he claimed described the end of the world. Now, with the day of reckoning fast approaching, Arthur is found dead. You, his faithful disciples in the Church of the Golden Pyramid, must discover who among your brothers and sisters has killed the beloved leader! Choose your path to victory and leave no stone unturned as you spend a day searching London for clues and characters that will allow you to avenge this sacrifice and, maybe, avert doomsday. Prepare for another all-new murder mystery treasure hunt from A Door In A Wall: Apocalypse How?

More pix here.

You Me Bum Bum Train...

Last night Sarah, Roger, Stuart and I went to Stratford - not to watch The Games this time but to play a game. Of sorts. We went to ride You Me Bum Bum Train. The personal theatrical experience that we love so much. It was amazing, powerful, funny & bizzare! Top notch!

It's hard to explain without giving the secrets away. It's like going to the theatre but you don't sit - you walk, crawl and (sometimes) get carried through the performance. There's a cast of hundreds but they all perform just for you. You go one at a time and you can either simple watch, laugh or take part as you want. It's brilliant. And very funny. You all meet up at the end and talk about what has just happened. Everyone wants to do it again!

"This is the eighth time the Bum Bum Train has pulled into London and the format is largely unchanged: each audience member is taken on their own immersive, interactive ride, stopping off at a series of disconnected scenes manned by some 200 volunteers. The experience relies entirely on surprise, but we can say the latest concoctions from creators Kate Bond and Morgan Lloyd are astonishing in both their realism and their logistics. Contrary to common criticism, they're about more than just spectacle. The show challenges your creativity, confidence and courage, allows the timid to find a voice and extroverts to revel. Perhaps more subtly, it prods at notions of control and trust. It's a very special 45 minutes indeed: eye-opening, magical, memorable and utterly unique."

Toft Hall..,

We had a fantastic weekend away at a country pile called Toft Hall - halfway between Stoke-on-Trent and Macclesfield.

There were nineteen of us - me, Stu, Andy, Tim, Michael, Andrew, Richard, Andre, Jeremy, Jonny, Andy, Kev, Gary, Nau, Darren, Mark, Dean, Nick and David.

The excuse, if any were needed, was Andy Cook's 50th and Timmy's 38th birthdays.

The hall was lovely, the company sublime and the weather shit. Still, we had a roaring time eating, drinking, dressing up, chatting and playing games.

It is a testament to the boys in that there friends are so nice and everyone got on so well as a group.

Pop Quiz - The Questions...

Last night the lovely David, the gorgeous Darren and I relived a few old memories and went down to the Pop Quiz at the Retro Bar in London's glitzy West End. The rules hadn't really changed but the fee had - up from £1 per team to £1 per person. Makes sense really as the bigger teams have more chance.
We got sixteen and a half out of twenty with just a few slip ups including a rather painful answer that we got right - but then changed after a misleading clue from the quiz mistress. The winners got seventeen and a half and won some CDs. As we came second we got to choose a prize too and won three Munny zipper pull. Mine's now on my camera strap.
So here are the questions. Give it a go (without Google!)
Noughties Round
01. Who had a hit with Hey Ya?
02. Who had a hit with a falsetto cover of Comfortably Numb?
03. What was Ms Dynamite's biggest UK hit? (spelling important)
04. Who had a top ten hit with Heartbeats in 2004?
05. Which band covered Grace's Not Over Yet (and added an "It's" in the process)?
Covers Round
06. What Bangles song did the Puppini Sisters cover?
07. David Bowie did a cover of Waiting For The Man. But who performed the original?
08. What Pointer Sisters song did song post-punk band Le Tigre cover?
Neil Diamond Round
09. "Where it began, I can't begin to know when. But then I know it's growing strong." Name the Neil Diamond song?
10. "Far. We've been travelling far. Without a home. But not without a star." Name the Neil Diamond song?
Seventies Round
11. Which punky poet fronted band had a much covered song called Dancing Barefoot? (need the full title of the band)
12. Who's first single was called Mongoloid?
13. Who co-wrote (and recorded) the track Sister Midnight with David Bowie before Bowie then recorded it himself under the title Red Money?
14. Who first recorded Re-make/Re-model?
15. Who recorded the track Needles in the Camel's Eye on their début album in 1974?
Guilty Pleasures Round
16. Who's début single was called Girls Ain't Nothing But Trouble using a sample of the theme tune of the 1960s television series I Dream of Jeannie?
17. Who had a song out called Rude Boy earlier in 2010?
18. Which drag persona has had viral hits and is all over Youtube with videos like Shoes, Txt Message Breakup and Let Me Borrow That Top?
19. Who had a big hit with Kiss Me, Honey, Honey, Kiss Me?
20. Who recordred The Man With The Golden Gun?