C.L. Raven's Blog, page 26

Dead Giveaway

Today we are handing over the keys to Sean and Dan Campbell, the brilliant brothers behind 90 Days Novel. We were honoured to have them in Ravens Retreat back in May when their debut novel, Dead On Demand was published and now we’re thrilled that they’ve accepted our invitation for a return visit. Well, they didn’t really have a choice. We accidentally locked them in on their last visit and they’ve been rapidly running out of food. But happily the sniffer dogs managed to find them and they’re back with a triple giveaway! So we’ll leave you in their safe hands and we’ll try to remember to show them where the exit is this time. Enjoy!

Sibling Author Giveaway: Everyone wins (twice!)

Hello!

We’re Sean and Dan, and this is our second time venturing into Raven’s Retreat. Last time we told you all a little about our book Dead on Demand which is a crime thriller wrote in 90 days to prove we could.

Since then we’ve been for sale exclusively on Amazon and in the three months since launch we’ve had some pretty good responses to the novel. With 27 reviews between the UK and the US and a 4. something average we think the challenge has been pretty successful, but it isn’t really up to us to decide. You guys get to the judge, jury and execution for all eBooks, and rightly so.

With that in mind we’re making Dead on Demand free for 5 days running from the 4th September to the 8th of September so that you can download a free copy and let us know how you think we did.

To take advantage of this all you have to do is:

1. Go to Amazon’s website:

USA: http://www.amazon.com/​Dead-on-Demand-ebook/dp/​B0080FCR2G/

UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/​Dead-on-Demand-ebook/dp/​B0080FCR2G/

2. Click buy for $0.00/ £0.00

3. Enjoy!

You can let us know how we did via email (authors at 90daysnovel.com), via a review (on Amazon or Goodreads) or simply be sticking a comment on this blog post.

As a small incentive every person who comments on this blog post (whether or not about the book) has the chance to win a $25 Amazon.com gift card (or £15 in the event of a UK winner). Comments need to be in before Sunday the 9th at midnight, and the winner will be selected by Cat and Lynx in a manner of their choosing. We seriously suggest the winner spends £2/ $3 of it picking up their awesome short story collection Disenchanted which is a modern day retelling that really does outdo the brothers Grimm.

So to make it clear, this promo is open to UK and US residents only (where allowed under local law) and the winner is responsible for any local tax payable on prizes. The gift certificate will be sent electronically within 5 working days of the closing date.

Better yet, this is an ‘Everyone wins’ competition. EVERY entrant can have a free copy of our very well received eBook marketing text ‘Can’t Sell, Won’t Sell’. Just email us asking for your copy after commenting (let us know which comment is yours) and we’ll send you over your choice of ePub or .mobi file.

That’s on top of the free copy of Dead on Demand we’re already giving you.

For more chances to win some fun goodies come find Dead on Demand at other blogs this week where we’ll be giving away signed copies, unsigned copies and other random stuff.

To recap: Grab Dead on Demand from the above links, and leave a comment on this blog post to try and win $25 AND bag yourself a guaranteed free copy of Can’t Sell Won’t Sell. No purchase required.

Double dip freebies, can’t say fairer than that!

Sean and Dan

How cool is that? Who doesn’t like free stuff? So visit them at 90daysnovel.com, like them on Facebook and follow them on Twitter @90daysnovel

Cover up

The moment we’ve all been waiting for is finally here! Well we’ve been waiting excitedly anyway. Soul Asylum’s cover is finished! And we will be revealing it you now, LIVE! We’d played around with different effects in Gimp and decided we wanted it in negative with flames. But we couldn’t do the flames so we handed the project over to Ryan of Fireclaw Films, who did Gunning Down Romance’s stunning cover and Disenchanted’s book trailer for us. We’re so glad we did! He did several versions until we found the one we were happy with and even did our own unique text because the text we wanted to use was hard to read. We can’t wait to hold the book, stroke it, kiss it and take it to bed as we won’t be putting it down.

We’ll shut up now. Here it is! *clapping like demented seals* Ryan, we can’t thank you enough! In a show of gratitude, we promise not to put a cold can of Red Bull down your back for an ENTIRE DAY! That’s how happy we are

Muscle Museum

Season 2 of Calamityville Horror is getting off to a good start. There has been a technical issue in season 1, resulting in the final episode, The Galleries of Justice, now being shown as the first episode of season 2. Basically, Ryan moved out and we lost his ultra fast Broadband. But this wouldn’t be Calamityville if everything went smoothly. If you want a slick, professional show with professional, well-behaved investigators, boy did you stumble upon the wrong show!

So for episode 4, we headed for Huntingdon to pick up our regular guest, L K Jay. We only got lost once and that was on the ring road. We didn’t feel too bad about that. Apparently, if you listen closely at night, you can still hear the ghostly cars driving around, unable to leave the ring road. After a quick baggage dump at her lovely flat, we piled into her car and headed for Peterborough.

Peterborough Museum

We managed to get to the museum without any hitches. Mostly because we weren’t leading the way. The museum is free, but we did have to sign a permit to be allowed our cameras, so we’re not sure how much we’ll be able to show you. The museum started life as a home, before being turned into a hospital. It is said to be the most haunted building in Peterborough. It is reputedly haunted by the ghost of a soldier wounded in battle in France and brought to Peterborough for treatment. He died not long after arriving. His ghost has been seen on the stairs. It is also haunted by a little girl who has been seen in the operating theatre, and a woman who calls for Lady Charlotte, the wife of the museum’s previous owner, Thomas Cooke.

Shortly after entering the museum we realised we were hungry. Having recently discovered a website which warns you not to go ghost hunting on an empty stomach in case you end up with stomach ghosts, (we’re not kidding) we decided not to risk it and went to get something to eat.

We returned to the museum, stomachs well protected against the pesky stomach ghosts, and started to explore. When we were in the surgeon’s office, Cat touched the grandfather clock, which is the only original piece of furniture from the time of Thomas Cooke. When she touched it, she got what we call ‘fish tank feeling’. It’s the barely heard of technical term for when you feel really dizzy, like your brain is swimming. If you want to replicate it, stick your hand in a full fish tank and you’ll know what we mean. Lynx experienced it when we were in the underwater exhibition.

Soldier, Solider

We moved on to the anglo-saxon and Roman exhibition to hunt for the Roman soldier who is so attached to his sword, he has reportedly been seen standing by the display case which holds it. We got Ryan to dress up in the Roman soldier costume provided, to see if we could lure the ghost. We also persuaded Ryan to wear a bonnet, but that was purely for our own amusement. One of the displays was of a skeleton family, who may be the first murder victims ever found. The man had an arrow lodged in his ribcage. Unfortunately, we forgot to bring our Tyvek suits and crime scene kit, so the identity of the murderer will remain unknown. Our money’s on the the butler.

We then moved upstairs to the part we were looking forwards to – the Victorian operating theatre. Our fish tank feelings worsened in here considerably. At one point, Cat was worried she’d have to leave, for fear of passing out. The theatre was brilliant. The bed had a blood stained sheet and there was even a bucket of fake blood on the floor. The display case had an array of old equipment and even the doctor’s patients’ notes. Lynx was about to head out of the surgery when her camera failed to connect to its battery. This has never happened before and she was using the new battery. She kept switching it off, taking out the battery then trying again. It still wouldn’t read the battery. Cat suggested she leave the surgery, see what effect that would have. The moment she stepped out, the battery reconnected and worked fine for the rest of the trip. We know that some people believe that ghosts can drain your equipments’ power sources and use their energy, but we’re just putting this down to an inexplicable technical glitch.

Theatre of screams

Our last stop in the museum was the Napoleonic prison ship. This was the coldest room in the museum, which was strange, as it was at the top of the museum, where usually the higher rooms are warmer. Again we had Ryan dress up as a solider and a prisoner. He looked more like a gnome, which was only confirmed by his impromptu gnome dance. Yes, it’s on film.

Peterborough Cathedral

The next place on our list was the cathedral. We got there just as a service was about to start. We were invited to stay, but decided to explore the adjoining graveyard instead. As graveyards go, it wasn’t very impressive. It clearly wasn’t the ‘in’ place to be buried. It’s apparently haunted by a white woman and a monk. Monks are very popular ghosts. You’d think after devoting their lives to God, they’d want to at least visit Heaven, but they seem to prefer hanging out on Earth, spooking tourists. As we passed a sarcophagus, the K2 bleeped once. It had been silent until this point. We moved around by the sarcophagus, but it didn’t bleep again.

We explored the rest of the graveyard then decided to go for coffee. The K2 started bleeping slowly, the needle gradually rising to 3.5 in the red zone as the bleeps got faster. It’s never done that before. Usually it just goes off, but this was really gradual. We were right by a cottage, which had a lamppost and fuse box next to it. We put the K2 to the ground, to see if there were any electrical cables beneath us, but it fell silent. We took it over to the railings of the cottage and pointed it at the fuse box. It was quiet. We returned to our spot, but the K2 didn’t bleep again. There were rumblings of thunder, so we figured the electricity in the air was probably the cause.

We took shelter in the nearby coffee shop, as it started pouring. The tension between the staff was worse than the impending storm. It’s a wonder the K2 wasn’t going crazy. It was tense! The place was too small for such an atmosphere and we were stuck there for half an hour until the rain stopped and the cathedral opened. Shortly before we left, the thunder returned. Grabbing our K2, we hurried into the rain. It didn’t respond.

The cathedral is stunning. There was a £3 permit charge per camera, so we only used Ryan’s iPhone for both filming and photography. The most frightening thing in the cathedral was the dramatic organ music that started without warning and scared the bejesus out of us. Sadly it wasn’t music accompanying the phantom choir that are meant to be here. We also didn’t see the terrified monk who has been spotted running down the aisle before vanishing. We did get to stand by Catherine of Aragon’s tomb, which we were pleased about. We didn’t even know she was here. We must’ve missed her check-in on Facebook.

Huntingdon’s about 3 1/2 hours from Cardiff, so we had a rare stay over. We don’t often stay overnight, one, because we don’t think it’s fair to leave our mum with the animal army and two, because our intermittent insomnia returns with a vengeance in strange places. But we’re glad we stayed, because in the morning we visited Nun’s Bridge in Huntingdon, which is haunted by a nun. The name kinda gave that away. She had an affair with a monk and they used to meet on the bridge. Sadly the only activity we got on the bridge, were the cyclists who had to avoid our tripod as we recorded our debrief. Though we did manage to scare a jogger. He was about to come on to the bridge, saw us, swiftly turned around and jogged away. Either he never meant to cross the bridge, or he was truly terrified of seeing us without makeup. Clearly he hasn’t read a fairytale in a  while. Trolls live under the bridge.

Let the Games Begin!

Going for Gimpic Gold

The Gimpic Games have officially started. Even though we haven’t yet filmed our opening ceremony, mostly because we don’t have Danny Boyle’s budget. On Monday, us – Lynx from The Kingdom of the Blood Skulls and Cat from the Pirate Islands – and fellow Gimpians, Ryan from Jerkuanius and Rich from the United Pimping Regency banded together to form an elite team of athletes. Well, kind of. Ryan and Rich both nearly died on the sand dunes. Ryan from lack of fitness, Rich from forgetting his asthma pump & continuously face planting in the sand. We knew it was a going to be a good time when Cat forgot to bring Ryan’s trainers, forcing him to compete in his socks. Rich kindly gave up one of his shoes and the pair of them hopped all the way to the dunes like a couple of gimps.

The course was extended and much faster. Rich must’ve been practising on the sly because there’s no way someone who’s never sand dune sledged could be that fast. He thrashed everyone’s times by one or two seconds on each run. There was cheating galore as we got Rich to push us to give us faster times and when Cat pushed Ryan, he promptly tumbled out. Allegations of drugs cheating were banded around when Ryan beat Cat in the head to head race, despite losing every single time trial. Suspicious, doncha think?

the Hero takes a fall

There were injuries aplenty when Rich kept falling off the sledge and headbutted the flagpole in his desperate attempt to escape the 2 second time penalty for missing the flag. And there was a collision of epic proportions during Ryan and Rich’s head to head race as Rich tumbled out, Ryan thought he was home free until his sledge stopped, only for him to see Rich hurtling on his sledge towards him. Ryan frantically paddled forwards but it was too late. They collided and crashed over the finish line in a tangle of limbs and sledges. Cat discovered she’d dislocated a finger when we returned home. Ryan was nearly sick when she manipulated it back in. Ryan hurt his back copying Rich’s winning headfirst style then when imitating Baywatch with the red sledge, tripped, face planted and mysteriously hurt his man parts. Cat took a photo of his pain filled face as he clutched his crown jewels and admitted he was no Baywatch Babe.

Cat and Ryan face off

Next up was sumo wrestling. Everything becomes instantly funnier when you’re wearing an inflatable sumo suit. We drew a ring on a flat surface at the very top of the sand dunes, donned our suits and wrestled our way to Gimpic glory. Cat proved to be a tiny dynamo as she beat Ryan in round one. Rich won round 2 by scooping Lynx up upside down, her little legs kicking like a beetle as he dumped her face down in the sand. The final was between Rich and Cat. Rich once again proved to be Gimpic champion and was presented with his medal and bouquet of wild flowers that he’d snapped off a nearby bush. We have a feeling those sumo suits WILL be making a return to the Gimpics…and a new event has been added – rubber ducky racing in the River Taff. There will be blood.

gimping for gold

World of War

brothers in arms

We were persuaded to visit Newton House’s World War 2 summer event, organised by Scott James (you may remember him from episode 5 of Calamityville Horror). There would be guns, history and soldiers in their uniforms. Hell yeah we were going! It was fantastic! We made the Glamorgan Home Guards on the barrier very suspicious as we kept passing them to fetch things from the car and only had one pass between the 3 of us.

stop or we’ll shoot!

We tried to convince them Ryan was a spy and should be shot but sadly the mischievous twinkles in our eyes gave the game away. Maybe next time…We spent ages in the US/German camp talking to the soldiers. Turned out, one of the soldiers was Ryan’s neighbour! And they’d never met. Small world. He loaded Ryan up with equipment and made him run about 50 yards, to experience what the soldiers had to experience. We were hoping he’d launch a grenade after him to fully add to it. Sadly not. Their reluctance to gun down this varmint was worrying. He must’ve paid them off.

Not only did we get to pick up the rifles (which were nearly the same size as us), we also got to sit in the genuine WW2 Jeeps! We were desperate to nab one for a test drive but no keys were left in them, sadly. Though we did get to play with the machine guns mounted in the back and pretend to shoot people How badass would we look filming the next Calalmityville episode in a WW2 Jeep? Does anyone have a spare one they don’t want? Preferably one with a machine gun?

Jeepers Creepers

The lady from the Medic tent asked if she could take our photo for her son as he used to be a Goth. Naturally we obliged. Even more coinkidinkally, one of the soldiers happens to run the website about the Bridgend POW camp that we tried to get into. Remember the pics of us squeezing through the fence? That one. And they’re having an open day! We’ll finally be able to see inside in a legal, won’t-have-to-run-from-the-cops manner! Our mum will be thrilled. And the escape tunnel is still there. Might have to recreate that German POW escape…

The battle re-enactment was brilliant. Scott told us the best place to film and we were right by the action. It was so exciting. Not only were the soldiers extremely friendly and knowledgeable, they were also really good actors and the German sniper was captured with only two casualties.

band of brothers

Then a group of soldiers came over and wanted their pics taken with us. Lots of pics They even let us sit on the bonnet of their Jeep. In the Resistance exhibition we met an old soldier who taught us about the Smith and Wesson revolver we were playing with. He also wanted our photo. It was like being celebrities! We weren’t even part of the event!

We returned to the basement where the K2 meter had given us such great hits on our last two visits. It was silent. Maybe because the audio wasn’t playing, though that wouldn’t have effected it anyway, but it’s the only explanation we can think of. The K2 didn’t go off anywhere else, which was very strange as Newton House has always given us plenty of K2 activity. Maybe the soldiers scared the ghosts away. In the wards there were a variety of tools with those scanning barcode things for Smart phones to find out about them. As our phones are so old, we ended up inventing uses for them. Eyeball grabbers, brain hooks and nose pokers being amongst the favourites. Cat tried to take Ryan’s jugular blood from an over sized syringe. None came out. Maybe he’s a vampire.

HALT!

We strong armed our sister and her family into going the next day. Apparently, as soon as they mentioned us, all the  soldiers raved about us (We’re now FB friends with 2 of them) Surely we can’t have made that much of an impression, not with the large number of people who were there. Although our outfits were very popular. We highly recommend everyone goes to Dinefwr to witness it first hand. It was amazing. Even more so because it was the first event Scott’s organised, so we were doubly impressed! And he did look rather handsome in his uniform

us with Scott James

Enter Sandman

making winners out of losers

There is a fever sweeping the country. Olymp-no, wrong one. GIMPIC fever. It’s the most talked about thing since Red Bull announced they would be lifetime sponsors of C L Raven. Hang on, might have dreamed that one. Anyhoo, you can’t escape Gimpic Fever. It’s like a big gimpy tidal wave that’s blitzing your home town and drowning you in its infectious fun. Our evenings have been filled with archery and Nerf gun practise and a quick go of space hoppering before Ryan fell off and declared our pixie stature was an unfair advantage. Also it appears his big man hands are hampering his efforts with the child’s archery set. We offered to cut off his hands. He declined. Obviously not that dedicated to winning then.

Yesterday we decided to practise the sand dune sledge slalom. Merthry Mawr are the highest sand dunes in Wales. Yes, these are no ordinary dunes. These are epic. It started off well when a topless hotty was running up and down them continuously, giving us something lovely to focus on while we struggled our way to the top. After the second climb, we were knackered. After Ryan’s first climb, he collapsed at the top and we had to poke him to make sure he was still breathing as he was a very unhealthy shade of dead. 50 shades of dead perhaps. Had the worst happened, we might have had to sit on him and slalom him down for rescue. Luckily a twitching limb confirmed life.

our sand dune sledge slalom

going for gold

The original course we plotted turned out to be a big fat failure. The sledge would not move under it’s own power. Disheartened that the event we were so excited about might not happen, we tried thinking of a solution. Then Ryan spotted a steeper part to the dune so we tried it. And sped down like tobogganing pros! The more we did it, the faster we got. And as predicted, a slight turn of the sledges had us crashing out and rolling like those riders in motorcross racing. Think of gymnasts doing tumbling routines in the floor exercises and that was us, except it was on sand, downhill and we weren’t wearing glittery leotards. (Though they might have been better than the skull trousers Lynx wore and the tight PVC trousers Cat wore). No bones were broken in the making of this historic fun. Then we learned you went faster and stayed in if once you hit your speed, you lay back. We were actually a little disappointed at the lack of tumbling this method created. We did time trials as instead of a slalom, this was to be our sprint course. After several attempts, Ryan’s fastest time was 12 seconds, Lynx’s was 11 seconds 52 and Cat was the undisputed champion with 10 seconds 31.

winning in style

If sand dune sledging doesn’t become an Olympic sport, something is seriously wrong. The good news is the chances of cutting yourself on the dunes is minimal. However the chances of broken bones, dislocations and and death are highly probable. Let the games begin!

The Gimpic Games

Forget being published and having our own ghost hunting show in Calamityville Horror, over the next couple of weeks, a certain event will be the greatest thing we’ve done. The Gimpic Games. Basically, Olympics for idiots. Us. We are SO excited about this. So excited, we keep laughing manically as we think up the next event. So far, events include space hopper racing, archery with children’s archery set, shooting with Nerf guns, piggy back obstacle course, timed obstacle course in a children’s playground, pillow shot putt, air hockey, arcade games, a floor routine and the canoe slalom, which involves rowing an ironing board down the stairs. That has caused controversy amongst the athletes as Ryan Ashcroft has deemed the event ‘too dangerous.’ Personally we think he’s worried he’ll lose as we used to toboggan down our twisty stairs in sleeping bags as kids. So instead we will be sledging down Merthyr Mawr’s sand dunes. Competitors come from all corners of the world, including the Pirate Islands, Kingdom of the Blood Skulls, Dragon Isles (formerly the Jerk Republic) and United Pimping Regency. Event organisers C L Raven had this to say when questioned about the safety of the games.

“The Gimpic Games will be heralded as the greatest sporting event in living memory. Injuries heal but the Gimpic Games live on. Sure someone might lost a finger or break a bone but sacrifices must be made for the greater glory. The pain of injury will vanish when that medal is placed around your neck. As long as no one dies, the event is considered a success. Health and safety is getting in the way of good clean fun.”

Wild At Heart

Today we’re thrilled to be welcoming fellow Indie author, Gena Mantz to Ravens Retreat. We’ve known her on Facebook for a while and she keeps us in a state of cuteness overload with the adorable pics of her kitties on Twitter. So she’ll be very at home amongst our animal army. We’ll go restock the Red Bull and let you get to know her.

Hello all,

 I am honored to be the guest blogger. Thank you for inviting me today. So a little about me. I am a legal assistant, belly dancer, wife, and mom to one human and several different types of animal kids. In fact as I type, my Anatolian Shepherd/Great Pyrenees ‘pup’ is nudging my ankle. (Louisa’s about 9 months old and weighs about 65 pounds, and always WHINING.)

I write paranormal novels and poetry. I’ve had a love affair with all things paranormal, Gothic, romantic, and particularly vampire since I was in my teens. (Which was about half a century ago, give or take a decade.) When I was in my teens, I wrote some fantasy-style stuff , but none of it survived the various moves. I have always been a storyteller. When my sister was a child, my mom often sent her to me for the answers to all those annoying why questions. Somehow, a wonderful story was told and all the questions my sister had were answered.

 I took a break from writing to be a human mom and raise our son while my husband was an over the road truck driver.  A few years ago, a librarian friend of mine got me in touch with a retired college instructor who was leading a poetry group at our local library. I began writing poetry and found I enjoy writing paranormal themes, mostly vampire. I am hoping to publish a short book of my poetry soon.

My first novel is an alternative look at small town life in Kansas, using humans, vampires and werewolves. I tried to address the themes of prejudice, inequality, marriage, and fidelity as well as family and acceptance in this book. It is a light, quick read. Let me put it this way, if my 13 year old niece or nephew read this, I would not be embarrassed. You can find my novel at  http://www.amazon.com/Wild-Hearted-ebook/dp/B008LD5DC8/ref=dp_kinw_strp_1  or for the UK http://www.amazon.co.uk/Wild-Hearted-ebook/dp/B008LD5DC8/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1343829066&sr=1-1 and is available in paperback or in Kindle. I also do Kindlegraphs.

I am working on my second novel, which will be published under a different name. The themes in it are more adult, and the content is not for children. It will be published under a pen name and it is still very much a work in progress. My main character in this novel, Isis, has her own blog, twitter, and email and I never know what she will comment on next. Her blog is isisthevampire.com, her twitter is isisthevampire, and her email isisisthevampire@gmail.com.

Well, I suppose I’ve chattered on enough about myself. Time to get back to working on my newest stuff. Thanks again for listening and have a wonderful day/evening/night!
Hugs and blessings to all
g

Urban Legends

When the plans for entering a location include Batman/Batgirl costumes, a grappling hook, a kosh and Jelly Babies in case we get hungry, we knew we were in for a fun episode. Episode two, season two of Calamityville Horror was an episode with a difference. Forget the stunning castles, creepy jails and spooky haunted caves. Yesterday was an urban exploration episode. In Pontypridd. The place dubbed one of the worst places to live and is nicknamed ‘Chav Town’, where being mugged for 20p is a regular occurrence. Our guest Rich, recounted his 20p attempted mugging story in full hilarious detail. We started out in the Malster’s Arms, the scene of Ryan and Rich’s drunken youth and also a location we used in one of our novels. The cellar bar is apparently haunted by a maid who hanged herself. Unfortunately we discovered there is no longer public access to the cellar bar. We strongly suspect Ryan and Rich’s drunken youth might have contributed to this Then we moved on to the location that spawned the wild access ideas dressed as Batman. The abandoned 1880′s theatre above the indoor market.

If you’re imagining a grand Victorian theatre, think again. The outside is a big, ugly concrete block. With no windows. Surrounded by a 12 ft wall. Attempts to squeeze through the padlocked gate failed so we headed into the market hoping to find a disused staircase. No such luck. We’d found photos on an urban exploration forum. Someone had managed to get inside and tantalised us with images of old seating and screens, projection equipment and the derelict beauty of a long forgotten theatre. Inside this hideous concrete slab was a stunning, crumbling timecapsule of Ponty’s history, locked away like a fading film star.

Cat tried to squeeze through the main gates but failed. Lynx tried to slither under another set of gates, but again failed. A couple of passing chavs helpfully told us to try using boltcutters. KNEW we were missing something from our ghost hunting kit. A new plan was needed so we we entered the market, hoping to find a hidden staircase that would lead us to our golden chalice.

We cased the outside, lurking suspiciously by some large metal gates at the back of the theatre. Someone called Rich’s name – an ex colleague of his, Kae. We explained why we were acting like loitering bank robbers and she was really interested in the show, so we invited her to join the episode after she finished work. We then snuck up the fire escape to see if we could slip in to the theatre that way. The stench was gut wrenching. We were in the area with all the bins, including a large vat of chip fat, slowly cooking in the sun. Covering our noses, we fled the scene and headed into an army surplus store, to see if we could gather equipment for our dramatic entry. We pictured ourselves emerging from the store dressed in full camouflage gear with a bag full of weapons, equipment and steel toe cap boots. The owner told us we’d never get permission to get inside the theatre and said our best bet would be to go in ‘covertly.’ According to him, if a window was broken or open, it wouldn’t be classed as breaking and entering if we got inside. They even offered us props to use for filming and said if we were caught by the fire escape, to tell security he sent us round there to take his rubbish to the skips. Think we found ourselves an accomplice.

We went to the pub to eat and plot then returned to the theatre with a renewed determination to gain access to this concrete Tantalus. Rich easily scaled the 12ft wall and disappeared down the other side. And that’s as far as he got. So instead we decided to add some special effects and Ryan filmed us and Rich diving dramatically out the way and hitting the floor as a missile hit the padlocked gate. Then security moved us on, claiming ‘you boys look dodgy.’ Yes, he meant Ryan and Rich, not upstanding citizens such as ourselves. Apparently there was an attempted break in at the theatre the day before and he helpfully informed us there was CCTV everywhere and we should wave at the cameras as we pass. Think he was hinting at something, but we couldn’t figure out what. Maybe he was suggesting we looked so stylish, we should admire ourselves on the monitors, as they would be doing. We were more annoyed that someone may have got in where we failed than we were at being moved on.

So we headed to our next location – a demolished outdoor swimming pool in Ynysangharrad Park. Except the whole of Ponty seemed to be there. We were conspicuously overdressed. There was more flesh on display than at a swimsuit contest, without the toned bodies. Two police officers seemed to follow us around the park. Whether it was the filming equipment that attracted their attention or the lack of nudity on our part, we weren’t sure. We sat near a big hole in the boards surrounding the swimming pool but there were too many people for even our ninja skills. After watching the Ponty natives barbeque themselves, we headed for the River Taff to photograph the graffiti. The most shocking piece we read declared ‘Kieran likes Tesco.’ That must’ve been an awkward moment when his mum found a Club Card in his wallet.

After returning to Rich’s to regroup, we met up with Kae to rescue the episode with our last planned location. The demolished shopping precinct. We strolled along the pavement then one by one, slipped through a small gap in the big boards  blocking the area off from the peasants. We disappeared down a staircase in the ground and found ourselves in the basement of a gaming shop. Gingerly treading across the broken phone fronts and soggy packaging, the two of us crawled through a gap in the wall and found ourselves in an underground delivery car park. We explored the darkened openings, the rest of the crew mysteriously vanishing. After five minutes, we heard someone approaching. Wondering if Michael Jackson had risen from the dead with a gang of badass 80′s punks to enlist us in a dance off of Bad, we limbered up. Turned out it was our crew entering through a different way, so ducked into a doorway. When they were close, we jumped out on them. Rich said he knew we were hiding but there was nothing they could do about it. The car park was wonderfully dark and creepy, the smell of damp rank as we investigated the rubble strewn stairways in the shops basements. If ever there was a suitable location for a horror film, this was it.

At one point we heard footsteps above us and hid behind the open doorway into another area, praying we weren’t discovered. None of us wanted to end the day in jail, especially since we’d promised to front up our guests’ bail money should that terrible event occur. We decided not to tell them the money in our wallets could only stretch for a couple of rounds in the pub. That would be bad morale for the crew. All was quiet so we resumed our urban exploration. As we were setting up the camera for our group shot, Lynx heard one of the shutters moving, like someone on the other side had banged in to it. We found our way to a rubble free staircase and emerged above ground, hissing at the burning ball in the sky like the vampires of Gothic horror legend. We scuttled across the vast cement floor of what used to be the precinct to the hole in the boards, slipped through and strolled casually away through the traffic jam. So while we managed to avoid driving through pedestrian zones (mainly ‘cos Rich lives within walking distance of everything), we’ve probably been caught on CCTV loitering with intent outside the theatre and trespassing the demolished shopping precinct. We know how to show our guests a good time!

Saxon the City

We started filming season 2 of Calamityville Horror yesterday. After a five week break between filming, we suspected things wouldn’t run smoothly. We were right. We had a 7:20 start to Oxford, where we were meeting the lovely Cinta Garcia de la Rosa, who’s over from Spain doing a writing course. It was all going so well. The roads were quiet. Too quiet. We were beginning to suspect the zombie apocalypse had happened already but we were enjoying the lack of traffic too much to be unduly concerned. Very nearly got mushed on a roundabout by a BMW but Cat’s quick reactions got Mickey onto the grass verge and we lived to film the episode. Clearly Fate is enjoying our disasters too much to cut our golden threads just yet. We had 4 maps of Oxford telling us how to get to different places, where the car parks were etc. Then we reached Oxford and everything was downhill from there.

Oxford is a series of one way streets that lead to dead ends, most of the car parks marked were private or we couldn’t find our way in. Don’t laugh, this was a serious problem. We ended up circling Oxford several times. Then we committed a terrible breach of the Highway Code. Yep. We drove through another pedestrian zone. Screaming pedestrians dove for safety, shaking their fists and cursing our very names. It was Nottingham all over again. The major meltdown that erupted was caught on camera but by the time we’ve bleeped out all the swear words, there might not be much left to hear The tour started at 10:20. At 10:15 we found a car park and wept as we paid £8.70 for the privilege of parking there. For that price we expected a personal valet service. No. The sign just warned you about leaving valuables in the car. We got lost trying to find Cinta, who was in the bus station. Right next to our car park. In fact as you climbed the stairs out of the car park, there was the bus station. But let’s never mention that again. We were a bit concerned about leaving Mickey in a place where the sign outside read ‘no drinking, no drugs and no sexual activity.’ It’s a grotty underground car park, not a brothel.

We eventually found Cinta and luckily she knows her way around Oxford and we arrived at the castle safely. It turned out to be Saxon weekend so we watched the combat training and played with a sword on the mound before heading off on a tour. Our tour guide, Duncan, who also goes by the name of Can Gerrett, was really good. At 6’3 he made us look like pixies.

Lynx, Cinta, Duncan (Can Gerrett) & Cat

We were taken up the Saxon tower, where a volunteer was required to go in the stocks. He chose Ryan, much to our delight. Finally that scurvy bilge rat was where he belonged.

Ryan stocks up his criminal ways

Unfortunately we had no rotten food to throw at him but he was left in there for quite a while. We went right to the top of the tower then down into the prison cells, where an identity line up board was set up. The four of us lined up to have our photo taken. Turned out our crime was highway robbery. Ryan’s criminal ways were obviously rubbing off on us. We were allowed to wander so us and Cinta dressed up in prison uniforms while Ryan dressed as a prison guard. As Cat was lining up the self timer, a kid walked past and kicked the tripod. Don’t know if it was deliberate but she glared threateningly at him and shook her fist as his departing back. Then as we were in the shot, he re-appeared and walked right in front of the shot. Had his parents not been there, he would’ve found himself as Oxford prison’s latest inmate. We journeyed into the hospital and were thrilled to discover a padded cell. Naturally we shut ourselves in and did an EVP session.

We headed down to the 900 year old crypt where creepy mannequins awaited. In fact, one of them was holding open his robe and had a mischievous grin on his wrinkled face. He was fully clothed but we strongly suspect he was flashing the two female mannequins sitting in front of him. They didn’t seem that excited by his wares. We listened to an abbreviated storytelling of Beowulf then bought our mug shot as well as ancient shackles and gaoler’s keys in the shop. They’re now hanging up in our summer house. Can Gerrett was pleased we’d filmed the tour for our show and wants us to put the footage on their site. Nice change from some of these places, who act like filming is akin to randomly kicking small children and graffiting their walls. As we walked through Oxford town, an unimaginative teenage girl shouted ‘freaks’ at us. In Italian! (Cinta speaks Italian so was able to translate). This is the first time we’ve been insulted in another language (that we know of) and we were surprisingly delighted by it. Italian, such a sexy language We think she was so overcome jealousy at our outfits that ‘freaks’ was all she could come up with. We returned to the castle for lunch, after paying £5.20 for an extra 2 hours parking. Ryan got harassed by a wasp then we filmed our debrief. We were about to leave when we were asked if we’d done the outside tour. We hadn’t. We were taken back up the Saxon mound we’d visited earlier. Luckily, Duncan was to be our guide again. When we were up there at the beginning, we ventured down a pitch black staircase to find a well. Without Lynx’s light, we couldn’t see anything. When we went down with the tour, it was lit up. We passed a building where they used to execute people. It’s now a trendy bar called the Living Room. We wanted to drag some peasants off the street to re-create history. We weren’t allowed. We were gutted. We were then taken to the old prison, which was built by the prisoners and is now a hugely expensive hotel. But to the side of the hotel is the original solitary confinement cells. We convinced Can Gerrett to close the door. Not sure the rest of the party were too keen on that as they left as soon as he opened the door. That’s what they get when they gatecrash our show. We stayed to explore. The castle was brilliant, the tour was fantastic and Can Gerrett even let us interview him.

the highway robbers were caught

We got lost leaving Oxford but that worked out better for us as it meant we avoided the toll on the Severn bridge. After the parking charges in Oxford, it was looking likely that had we crossed the bridge, Ryan would’ve been forced to dance for spare change. We ended up behind a Range Rover towing a piece of climbing wall. We’re not joking. It was an overhang piece. He kept veering into the grass verge and we were convinced he’d tip over at any minute. He didn’t. We were a bit gutted. The wall would’ve made a great feature wall in our house. Sadly he went a different way and we didn’t get an unusual souvenir.

Oh and Ryan and Cat suffered sunburn – Ryan on his face, Cat on her chest. Boy, was his face red! (Sorry, couldn’t resist the Simpsons quote) Lynx and Cinta, who were covered up, escaped unharmed.

let’s start a riot