I also liked the Duck Decoy (Day One Part Four)

Where were we? Ah yes, in the skitmobile on our way to Priddy following local boy indylead (nominative determination perhaps) who… didn’t know where he was going. With much humour, we all pulled into the Wookey Hole car park one, two, three, parking alongside each other with Olympic level choreography. Indy came tapping on our window and skit thrust the roadmap book into his hand.

Comic interlude over, we were off again at high speed through narrow country lanes. To our left, the very last rays of light slipped away from the fields of Somerset hinting at the valleys and fantastic views we would never see.

And then Priddy.

We knew we had got to Priddy because we suddenly found ourselves in a village-sized car park. Inching along in our convoy, I got a text message: Find somewhere to park! Skit turned on her parking-sensors and turned around, finding a tiny space on the side of the road between two parked cars. I jumped out of the car and helped her back into it and I have to confess that my thought processes ran a little like this: I wonder if she’d actually back into this car if I don’t say stop first? But I chickened out and shouted “stop” in a strangled voice when she was just about to touch. Sometimes you have to act like a sane person to get along in this world.

Out in the dark in a strange village, surrounded by cars that looked like they wanted to eat Paris and surrounded by villagers with pitchforks, we wondered where our fellow Hobblings were. We walked to the pub where we had last seen our convoy friends which also seemed to be where everyone else was heading (oh, I lied about the pitchforks, by the way). Then we got a phone call at the same time as the silhouette of indy’s fedora appeared on the horizon. The Hat was our beacon at many points during this evening. Indy just had to stand in front of a light and we pricked our Hobbling senses and formed a quorum around him.

The smaller-bladdered folk used the pub loos as I giggled stupidly at the poster that advertised “Skittles night”. We had about an hour to kill until the fireworks and used it to allow me to purchase some soup (oxtail, mmm) and for everyone to sit in the pubs gardens and natter.

Before 7pm, we got off our slightly cold rear-ends and planted ourselves in front of the huge pile of twigs on the village green. There was some judgement going on elsewhere in the green over which “guy” was the best. What a delightful competition where the children of the village work hard to create a facsimile of a man only to have them, whether winner or loser, burnt to a crisp on the village bonfire (the guys, not the children…). The guys (around ten in all) were placed on the bonfire and then came the moment we had been waiting for… the lighting of the bonfire.

They lit the other side to where we were standing. So it took a while for us to even notice.

But the people tending the bonfire, a job skit must have envied, kept lighting our side of the bonfire until it finally caught and then it roared into life. As if the gates of hell had been opened, the air crackled with the heat, burning the flesh off my bones.

And the other Hobblings just smiled and edged closer as if they weren’t feeling like a lamb roast.

Not really enjoying the intense heat, I hid my face behind my gloved hands and protected myself from the radiation. I did enjoy watching the guys burn though especially the one whose head fell right off and rolled a little way.

I wandered away from the fire and watched a flame juggler for some time before rejoining my fellow Hobblings. They had moved a little away from the fire as it went into its fusion phase and sat on some sacrificial coats on the muddy field. Indy actually chose to be a manly man and remain standing which was helpful as I directed him to stand between me and the fire causing a wonderful indy-shaped shadow of cool.

The fireworks started at 7:30pm. Being a small village and a free display (well, free if you managed to avoid the stewards with their tins especially the small ones (stewards that is, not tins)) I wasn’t expecting much. And not much was on offer. A few bangs, a few whizzes. Kind of disappointing but I hadn’t been to a firework display for four years and wasn’t complaining. An annoying announcer kept on talking over a tannoy, rallying the crowd (some of whom were dressed up, incidentally. I spotted one Spider-man wannabe with stripy socks) to call for more fireworks. And so more fireworks did come, as lame as the last.

One part of the display involved a special guy rigged to some gallows. The announcer spent some time talking about non-violence and a world without prejudice and hate… before telling the story of the evil Catholic and asking the crowd “should we kill him?” to which the villagers waved their pitchforks and shouted “yes!”

I was wondering if the villagers would turn on the strangers in their midst at any moment but they seemed content with someone stuffing fireworks into the guy and lighting the fuse. Quite chaotic and followed up by a non-spinning Catherine wheel.

Odd village customs aside, this was the turning point of the display. Suddenly they brought out the big guns. The fireworks came and came and came, a superb choreography of lights and sounds. Out on the distant hillside I could see a guy running for his life as he lit box after box of fireworks.

So paint me impressed. And happy. After weeks of pestering people “we have to see fireworks, we have to see fireworks” I had got what I wanted. Plus disturbing calls for an execution.

It was late. We had had a wonderful day of Hobbling fun. But alas, it had to come to an end. Indy and Blue needed to return home as Blue had work the next day and it had to end sometime anyway. So we waved them goodbye.

Sky had made the wise decision to return to the Hobbling Hayloft rather than attempt to drive strange country lanes late at night. It wasn’t really much of a decision for her, I hope. After a brief discussion by skit’s car, biped and I swapped so I rode with Sky. Apparently I was the better navigator, so said biped who had no way of judging. I expect she just wanted to be in the car with the Battlestar Galactica soundtrack but Sky’s wasn’t so bad: we got Buffy. As long as it is tv related, I am smiling.

Unfortunately, the smiles were fixed grimaces as, like Royston Vasey, once you entered Priddy, you could never leave. The traffic appeared to be moving when we joined it albeit at a walking pace. It soon came to an absolute halt. No movement whatsoever. We sat in the queue to leave for a long long time. Sky turned the engine off and we listened to the music and attempted some small talk. I glanced in the wing mirror and saw two cars back biped looking glum. As I remarked upon this to Sky, as we had no idea where we were in relation to skit and biped, an ominous black shape loomed over my window and tapped on it. It was skit to share with us the brilliant news that she was stuck behind us.

I don’t remember how long we were stationary for. But it was a long time and it made me worried for no particular reason other than I am always worried about something. But somehow, there was life somewhere and the cars did start to move. It was slow at first (and up a hill so it wasn’t much fun for Sky to drive) but we picked up speed eventually.

Pursued by skit across the dark Somerset countryside, we had to make a couple of random choices thanks to a lack of signposting but never got lost thanks to Sky’s quick glance of the map before we left. It was incredibly dark but on the way I was aware of being in Cheddar Gorge and I gaped (ha) at the rocks either side of the winding road.

After driving through Cheddar, it was pretty easy going until we hit Winscombe, the village nearest the village too small to be on any map. Once in Winscombe it was up to me to remember the obscure turn-off to Barton.

I actually did but I didn’t tell Sky to turn off it until it was too late. It wasn’t my fault that the sign was too small to read until we were right alongside it, was it? But at least this put us in a better formation as skit needed to be in the lead to enter the farm first and park while we sorted Sky out. As we turned into the driveway, I leapt out and rang the doorbell to the “office”. I felt rather bad as it was past 9pm and it must have been rather late for farmers. But our guy was up and friendly as he agreed to get extra bedding for us.

Sky parked her car in the main car park. (Skit was rather proud that she had her own private car parking space right by the cottage as no one else was as privileged amongst the holiday makers). And we showed Sky our fabulous abode.

We were tired. And not really as hungry as we were tired at first so many of us snacked on cake and rhubarb wine (which tasted exactly like rose with overtones of rhubarb (apparently- I am not sure I know what rhubarb tastes like) and I was not a huge fan). I heated up the remains of Friday night’s spag bol and forced biped to make some of her amazing salad at knife point. And so we all managed a rather respectable meal without actually planning it at all.

And we watched Angel.

Angel is always good. Judgement, in case you were wondering. Actually, did we watch Are You Now Or Have You Ever Been as well that evening? I forget…

You may expect a group containing me, biped and skit to just watch dvds all night.

We did not.

We were social.

Oh yes.

I had brought one of my favourite games with me though I rarely get the chance to play it: Kill Doctor Lucky. The rules seemed a bit complicated but everyone was a very able games player and soon caught on aided by the game’s structure which includes a period at the start for learning and constructing strategies.

Sky’s strategy seemed to be to follow biped wherever she went, thereby ruining both their games. It also involved trying to kill Doctor Lucky with Bad Cream. Fortunately for biped, Sky soon lost track of her in the many rooms of the Lucky Mansion and biped was let loose with the Civil War Canon. Unfortunately for skit, poised with the Monkey Hand, and for me, oiling my Chainsaw, biped played the winning card (some weapon I can’t even remember, alas). The real tragedy though was that Sky never had the chance to attempt to kill Doctor Lucky with… the Tight Hat.

After being broken into fits of giggles by that, we packed the game away and got out Trivial Pursuit (and the Mayan Gold Green and Black’s Chocolate with, of course, special Mint Mix tea flown straight from T2 in Melbourne courtesy of Em). Now, this game is meant to be tough but perhaps it was made tougher by being many decades old, so old that many answers to questions weren’t even true any more (USSR, currencies etc). The question-setter seemed to be a bit obsessed with London bridges and slavery, sprinkling the most impossible of questions with the most stupid like “how do you spell misspelt?” which even biped, who claims to be as bad at spelling as navigating, could answer. The game became more fun for the player asking the questions as we allowed quite outrageous hints to be given.

At some point when I was being asked a question, I just couldn’t be arsed any more. Like a wall of pillows, I ceased to think and needed, with a zombie-like fixation, to go to bed. It was late. Very late.

The rest is a haze as I must have struggled into my pyjamas, washed and gone to bed. I recall skit coming in quite soon after. (Sky was on the sofa bed (which I hope was comfy, I never asked…) in case anyone was wondering if she bunked up with biped). I think I may have giggled as sleep took me about anal sphincter calibration. I do that.