8/25/2005 08:26:00 PM|||James O'Malley|||

At the end of my last update, I said, "I'll try and break a world record or something to make the next update exciting!" - whilst this sounds like a throw-away remark, similar to David Kelly's "I'll be found dead in the woods", much like Dr Kelly, I too was fully serious.

Of course, as usual, I was accompanied by Heather- who was equally as, if not more enthusiastic than me. What were we doing? We were taking part in the Leicester libraries "Everybody's Reading 2005"- in other words, an attempt to get the most people, reading the same thing, at the same place, at the same time. The previous record was 1000 people in San Francisco. The equally internationally renound city of Leicester was going to try and beat this record, by getting over 1000 people reading a "passage" from The Salt Pirates of Skegness by Chris d'Lacey. It was such an exciting feat, apparently some people had travelled all the way from India just to be there. It's a good job we wern't reading Pinocchio!

Incidentally, and somewhat uninterestingly, this world record attempt was being held at the same place as BBC News on Tour was a few weeks ago. Now it was the turn of a mass-reading thing, which was a part of the so-called Leicester Expo, which is a council run series of activities that are being held... for the sake of it.



When we got there, a band we thought were called Mellow Harmony were performing. Later investigation reveals that this is in fact a woman's name. The rest of the band must have been generic musicians. Perhaps due to crowd apathy, or the fact that everyone there just wanted to get the reading over and done with, when she finished a song, she didn't get many applause. I think perhaps the loudest applause came when she left the stage- despite what came next was infinately worse. Mellow, if you're reading this, having google'd for your name, you're not a bad musician. Not my cup of tea, but infinately better than Complex Trout.

Who?

Unfortunately, we had to endure the warm-up act before the main event. They were a quartet of poets/generic entertainers calling themself "Complex Trout". As the name accurately suggests, it was a group of "wacky" people, who prance about on stage making fools of themselves. Heather was right in saying they were funny... but not in the way she was thinking. They were funny in the "I'd cross the road to avoid them" sort of way.

They arrived on stage to one of Franz Ferdinand's songs- apparently it was called "Take me out". That's the name of the song, not, unfortunately, Complex Trout giving instructions to a sniper on a well positioned roof top. They had it so when a particular lyric was sung, the music was muted, and they sang "Complex Trout". They danced to it too- it was certainly interestingly done. There were parts in it where the dance seemed pre-planned, with them all being coordinated, and other moments where they sort of did their own thing.

I've always hated the sort of "viewer participation" entertainment- from when I was a child, I never participated in the kids things at places like Haven holiday parks, and even now I can't bear to watch TV programmes where members of the public are involved, such as phone-ins. This is mainly why I disliked Complex Trout.

It was a pirate themed event because of the book the record attempt was using- so the Trout "crew" were all "pirated up". Sort of. They'd managed pirate hats. They decided to introduce "us" to each of the inconsequential bunch. This basically involved the audience parroting a pirate-based catchphrase. They tried to get the audience to participate in swaying and waving and so on. I didn't participate in any of the "fun", much to Heather's annoyance. She was really getting "into" the spirit of things, prancing about, waving and smiling. I just sunk my head into my disproportionate hands and tried to believe I wasn't in the middle of this humiliating crowd. The news media were there filming it all- hopefully, they'd be a shot of the whole crowd swaying and doing piraty things, with me, stationary in the middle. In terms of bizarre psychological impact, because I knew that everyone around me was swaying (and shouting "port" or "starboard" each time they switched direction), I found myself trying my hardest to remain absolutely still. Like some sort of monk. I worried that if I was seen to even move an inch, it would look like I was participating.

They were a cancer on my vision.

I think the thing that annoys me is that pirates are now seen as a humourous thing- an object of mirth and enjoyment. Children are encouraged to act and dress like pirates, and celebrate pirate culture. If you'd told a merchant in the South China sea this, circa 1600, I doubt he'd see the funny side! In four hundred years time, will future people, with their flying cars and green hair be encouraging their children to dress up and act like, say, terrorists? Will we be getting holograms of the future entertaining children by being Osama Bin Laden, Mullah Omar, and Gerry Adams? Rather than shouting "Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum" will they be shouting "Death to the west"?

After enduring this for a good few minutes, and getting to hear the Franz Ferdinand song again, with the audience this time dubbing the "Complex Trout" lyric, we finally got on to the actually record attempt- the reading bit, finally.

The author came on stage, and clearly had less shame than Trout. He was dressed as what I assume was a pirate. I have a horrible feeling the costume shop might have sold him a civil war Royalist costume, but not told him. He was dead enthusiastic- it was his book afterall. On stage, he lead the reading of his book. Despite being an extract, one got the feeling that it had been modified to include a token local reference- Leicester was mentioned a few times in a somewhat unneccessary way. The reading was slow- presumably to let the kids in the audience keep up. We got there in the end, though- to much jubilation. We were now world record holders in reading-aloud-the-same-thing-as-many-others-at-the-same-time.

A later count revealed that 1,256 people had taken part- owning the previous record holders by a good 250. Not that it looked like it at the time. We estimated there were only a few hundred people there, and to be honest, there could have been. There didn't seem to be anyone checking we were all reading it- and the organisers could have just registered many times themselves. Not that Leicester libraries are such an evil organisation.

In terms of demographic, the participants were mainly small children and their families, and drunken students from Leicester's two Universities- I'll be a part of the latter group in only a matter of weeks. Of the few other people who didn't fit into either of these groups, Heather and I were one, and a dischevelled man drinking a can of beer, whilst smoking three cigarette ends (I assume he'd already worked his way through the rest of them). Needless to say, we didn't stand near him- he didn't look like he was taking part, anyway.



After breaking this amazing record, we had a wander around Leicester. By "we", I mean Heather and I- NOT the 1,255 other people who had broken the record and myself. We ended up at the beach. Not a real one, obviously- Leicester is hundreds of miles from the nearest coastline- "Salt Pirates" would be rubbish in Leicester. The council had covered an area of Leicester, around a fountain, in sand, and retailed candy floss and CocaCola, and other beach-like things. Heather really liked it as walking across it was just like a real beach! She also pointed out, many times, that I could have got my face painted. "No", I said, earning me a disappointed facial expression, that was something like this: ":-(". I tried to think of a way I could "soften" my refusal, perhaps conceed some ground slightly, to cheer her up from her obvious disappointment, and then realised what exactly I was talking about. "I am NOT getting my face painted", I reiterated.

Bought another scratchcard. Lost.

In conclusion- we broke the record, and Complex Trout broke my spirit. I had a good day overall, and I am no longer just JAMES O'MALLEY, I am JAMES O'MALLEY WORLD RECORD HOLDER. And I've got a certificate to prove it!

|||112500262098799743|||Record Breakers