PETER ROBERTS:
I return to the safety of the bar.
Here rests David Redd drinking water ("It's free.") and avidly licking a breakfast square of orange
marmalade. Uh, hello David.
Ken Eadie engages me in conversation with Gunther, bemused mundane of Swedish origin and sudden fannish
tendencies. Guinness is consumed to ease explanations. The barmaid glares indiscriminately and curses
"them" (being we) . Gunther turns slowly, clicks his fingers, and recalling English, barks "Hey you!
Shanty!" The barmaid's stare burns through Gunther and shrivels me without fuss. I teach him English as
she is spoke:
"I say, please excuse me, but would you mind terribly if you could kindly serve me with a shandy?"
Forty minutes later, by dint of £5 note waving, a shandy is finally procured - oh, and a Guinness please...
I return partywards, but am waylaid by Simone Walsh who decides to introduce me to "someone unlikely", gazes
round and it's hello, Jim Marshall. Looks a rugger player, but is of genuine fannish nature and therefore
cannot be ultimately "unlikely". I return to talk vaguely to Simone Walsh and Diane Lambert, also Mike Moorcock
(of splendid hair, height, and girth) who offers whiskey. Fine, but I rush off for a Guinness to re-establish
normal tastes before burn-out.
Jim Marshall (ns)
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Simone Walsh, Ramsey Campbell (ns)
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A conglomeration of fans is discovered led by mad Brian Hill and ever jovial Julia Stone. We (for reasons
unrecalled) organize Queue Fandom, for the British love of same, and begin therefore to queue. Seven of us,
in line, before open door - queuing patiently. Enter mundane. Bewilderment, hesitation, "excuse me ?" About
turn quickly before she comes back: same queue, same patience, different direction. Re-enter mundane.
Uncertainty, wan smile, then stumbles past and is not seen again. Plans are laid to hold queue of epic
proportions in front of Gents' bog the morrow - never realized unfortunately, but next year?
Meanwhile Gray Hall is busy imitating Mike Moorcock with some vigour and success - others join in, forming
a strangely garbling group...
Brian Hampton and Arthur Cruttenden, bristling in normal fannish beard (but not wearing autographed tea shirt!),
announce a room party. Hola! This I must see - perhaps room 265 contains the expanding Tardis or mayhap he has
invented a fiendish shrinking ray (a Manta-vani joke). The party is of modest dimensions, however, and of fairly
short duration - fans being of lesser endurance than before, perhaps, and in cramped style. Dave Fletcher
taciturnly bearded, Arthur and Brian talking aircraft, Jim Marshall (sleeping), someone camera-flashing
(Norman Shorrock?), and Jill Adams chatting through a variety of subjects.
Arthur Cruttenden, Peter Roberts, Jill Adams (ns)
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Films are being shown all night in the depths of the hotel, Brian and I decide, however, to outfan the
film-fans and stay around longer than them without indulging in mere watching. This is doomed, however: the
bar closes, lights are dimmed, the corridors extend into cold and soundless twilight. Hunger is paramount
by 5.00am (Brian Burgess having long sold out and gone); an itinerant Bram Stokes, mane flowing proudly,
kindly informs us through full mouth that a loaf of bread has inadvertently been left in the dining room.
We consume same with tomato and Daddies Favourite Sauce.
All are dead, but the film fans. Brian disperses (a difficult feat), I join Ken Eadie and Ian Williams
screen-gazing at Roger Corman shorts. I am entertained by Poe rehashing until a Topper film of singular
lack of merit. I disappear to room, intending to return later and view The Trip. But I awake on...
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