Be Excellent To Each Other

"Dayyyy Foower in der Big Brudder hisehurld and"

SSSSSPPPPPPPOOOOOINNNNG!

How the hell did he get in here?

Anyway, on with business. The remaining players are

JBR
Dudley
The Rev Owen
Craster

This is the last day aboard the balloon. Unfortunately for three of you, it will be your last day on the planet. Yes, at 10pm tomorrow night, one of you will be crowned Bransons Balloon champion and be awarded some kind of prize once I retrieve it from the back of the sofa.

The gloves are off. You have to give your fellow balloonists both barrels and then throw the gun at them for good measure. But wait, you will need ammunition. Therefore, like the blokes at the start of The Prisoner, we want information. Answer the following questions.

1. Did you ever dance with the devil in the pale moonlight?
2. What is the airspeed velocity of an unladen sparrow?
3. Sleep with Anne Widdicombe or slow agonising death?
4. The geo-political situation in Germany in the 1930s. Discuss.
5. Daddy or chips?
6. What do we want? And when do we want it?

You may use drawings. Show your working. Tell the other inhabitants why they are wrong.

This is it, folks. The big one. Make BeEx proud. Or at least, not embarassed.

If I was alive my answers to these questions would be AWESOME.

1. I wanna know, have you ever seen the rain? Could it be I'm falling in love - with you baby?
2. So many and varied are the swallow species that I feel its laden or unladen nature is surely an attempt to distract our attention, once again, from the real issue - why is the swallow unladen, and are many baby swallows to suffer from Daddy's inability to find work? The policies of this government have led to very real hardship - no, let me finish - for avian creatures of all shapes and sizes, leaving perfectly serviceable load-bearing birds out in the cold and warmth, singing quite literally for their supper. Crude attempts to make us guestimate their speed, in order to suggest they commute to foreign climes in order to feed their family are no better than propaganda of the worst kind.
And that should be left to the geese.
3. I can do sleep. And the line "it's not you, it's me" has served people well through centuries.
4. To take one country in isolation is invidious but Germany occupy a special place. Having missed out on colonisation and yet provided so much enduring thought and culture, Germany was left with a very real problem - take what's in the box or twist. Despite the objections of many, they chose to twist, taking on a leader they could not get along with, leading to a war they could not win. Tiresome stereotypes have abounded - the bringer of so much classical music and philosophic advancement, reduced to an image of teutonic efficiency and periodic scares that they're coming back to take the bits of Europe that were missed the first time around. If only they had instead headed for a neo-geo political situation, played a bit of tennis and some 2d shooters all would have been well, and their politicians would have deserved their eventual reputation for poor eyesight, their scientists would have had to invent sustainable power for us all and the world would be a better place.
5. Chips are tastier, and they win every time. Daddy must return to his room or he gets the hose.
6. To get off this balloon without spring-loaded assistance; a can that never empties; a self-cleaning urinal on every train. Any time before it blows up;6.30 of an evening;10.30 of an evening.

1. Nah,fucker never buys the drinks.
2. Between 50 and 65kph (look it up, I'm right).
3. Still the best offer I've had all month.
4. Fucked. But marginally better than Zimbabwe just because they had prettier notes.
5. A literal choice in my case since he always steals all mine. Give a man chips and he eats once, give a man a chip loving dad and he can have a slightly reduced number of chips whenever he likes by getting the dad to cook them.
6. To stay in the motherfucking balloon. When? 10pm, obv.

1. Quite possibly, back in my drinking days.
2. None, now Craster's eaten it.
3. There's a difference?
4. Nasty men feed on a desire among some sections of populace to restore Germany's standing after humiliation in 1918.
5. I'd get my daddy to buy me chips. Best of both worlds!
6. Sleep in a cool room. NOW.

Why the others should die.

JBR - JBR could very well stand for Jade (Goody) Blows Rodney (Trotter), which is an appalling mental image. He's an evil, evil man to make us want to think about such horrible things. I mean, here is a person who actually wants you to think of a not-very-bright reality TV star giving head to a much-loved lanky sitcom character EVERY TIME YOU SEE HIS NAME. Surely a man like that can't survive?

Dudley - If you swap two of the letters in his name around you get dudely, which sounds very much like it might be a real word, but isn't, meaning you might use it in conversation by mistake. "Oh man, that man is so dudely," you might say, making a complete fool of yourself. If you say it to a girl you like, it might make the difference between her going out with you and dismissing your advances, meaning that Dudley has gone and ruined all your chances for future happiness. What if you were meant to be together and have a child that found the cure for AIDs during a sponsored trip to Mars to raise money for orphans? Dudley will have ruined that for you - and, indeed, all of us who'd quite like to see AIDs cured one day. Dudley: friend of AIDs, enemy of man.

Craster - An anagram of Craster is "restcar". You know what that means? He's subliminally trying to get us to fall asleep at the wheel and die. He WANTS us to die in fiery wrecks, quite possibly taking other people with us. Maybe nuns. Maybe even cute family pets that happen to be on the way to the vet. See that cute doe-eyed basset hound with the limp? He's got a sore paw, the poor little guy. Oh! Look at his sad little face! He's in the car, on the way to be made better and - BAM! - one of us falls asleep and collides with the car he's in. His head hits the windscreen, his skull shatters, but lives on for another few minutes in appalling pain as he burns to death. That's what Craster wants - how can you let a man like that live?

Cogent reasoning from the Rev Owen there. But ultimately, an exercise in misdirection;

The Rev Owen - suggesting a reverend who is somewhat impecunious, no subject is given for the owing, just the fact that he is owing, and thus to everyone, wearing a collar so as to avoid being crunched by the debt collectors. Combining such a wealthy body - the church - with his indebtedness leads us to that other body that combines immense power and great debt, the Great Satan (oh the irony) itself, the USA. From there a quick tap into popular world opinion shows us that the good points are played down, the bad noticed and producing great dislike. Bad enough you might almost think the USA has had its time and started to go off; if it has started to go off then there is only one option available.

That's right, it's got to go in the rubbish...

...the Rev Owen is Dusty Bin. Do not pick him.

It doesn't work. The debt collectors come anyway.

Not a reason to see me die, though.

1. Did you ever dance with the devil in the pale moonlight?
Yes, but I didn't inhale.
2. What is the airspeed velocity of an unladen sparrow?
Purple
3. Sleep with Anne Widdicombe or slow agonising death?
So me on top or her on top then? Me on top. If I have to fornicate with the beast, I'm at least putting myself in a position to make a quick getaway.
4. The geo-political situation in Germany in the 1930s. Discuss.
What people persistantly fail to understand is that there was no 'Germany' in the 1930s. The whole thing was a conspiracy engineered by the Illuminati to bolster collapsing levels of manufacturing and scientific progress in post WWI Western nations. What was once Germany was occupied by teams of construction engineers and actors, all in place to create the appearance of a nation rebuilding after war, but all the construction was papier mache and there was no indigenous population. All that was required was that there be sufficient political rhetoric from what was Germany to get the allied nations back onto a war footing to justify increased taxation and public spending cuts. WWII never happened, just like the moon landings. You've all been had, you sheep.
5. Daddy or chips?
Presuming that we are here referring to Big Daddy, there is no choice. Big Daddy has already eaten all the chips. And licked the plate.
6. What do we want? And when do we want it?
Identification of the Higgs-Boson particle! Now!

Regardless of all that, however, there's an important reason why I should be the person to survive this. You see, I'm not the man they think I am at home, oh no, no, no.




I'm a rocket man. Rocket man burning out his fuse out here alone.

Given this is your last day* to impress the judges, you lot are very quite.

*chucks in thirty crates of cider and ten packets of fags*

'Impress the Judges?'

Do you think this is some kind of game? For most of us this thread ends in death - a little sober reflection is quite possibly a reflection of civility, a counterpoint to 4 days of snipe and countersnipe.

Having said that, I'm going to smoke the shit out of these fags.




And throw all the cans at the others, hoping to 'accidentally' kill one or more of them with a blow to the head.

"Dans ce pays-ci, il est bon de tuer de temps en temps un amiral pour encourager les autres."

Air traffic control has told me that it can't possibly handle three bodies flying through the air this evening without implementing some kind of stacking system, so in the best/worst traditions of Big Brother, time for a surprise spoinging.

Alas, the end is near, but it is nearer than he expected for... Dudley.

SSSSSSSSPPPPPPPPPPOOOOOOOOIIIIIIIINNNNNNGGGGGGG

*splat*

Wow. That looks like a butterfly.

The remaining three contestants have until 10pm to impress upon the judges why they should live and the others die. Hop to it!

I repeat what I said earlier - JBR is trying to infect our minds with terrible mental images and Craster wants us to die, taking cute animals with us.

Of course I want you to die, you insignificant fool! It's every man for himself. I want you dead, I want JBR dead, I want that silly hamster that's running around dead. All three of you, bloody smears on the landscape below, leaving me free to soar away in my balloon as was always intended.

Er... since when was 4:30 the deadline?

That's a shame I didn't get a chance to participate today.

Oh, you participated. Your SPOOOIIINNGGGing was the first of a glorious three. My prior but treacherous partner in discourse JBR will follow, as will your car-park fancying fellow treekiller Rev Owen.

Wake up! Time to die!

The balloon wafts gently towards the wide open flat plain, where a welcoming committee have laid out a multitude of bouncy castles and nice soft, fluffy pillows.

Unfortunately, the balloon has to cross a wide open flat plain which is covered with spiky branches and thistles. There is also a welcoming committee, but they seem to be pointing first at their bellies, then at the balloon, then at a giant cooking point. Fate is a cruel mistress.

The third place, the bronze medal, the one who stands on the podium looking like Sandy Toskvig is....


Craster



SSSSSPPPPPPOOOOOOOIIIIIINNNNNNG


That leaves us with two. The Rev Owen and JBR exchange glances. This is like Christmas Day in WW1 immortalised in immortality by the er... immortal Paul McCartney. Like Gorbachev and Reagan. Like Ian Paisley and Gerry Adams. Each have an arm outstretched intending to make a gesture of friendship that binds them together and makes them fogret all the abuse, all the mud they have slung at each other. Their hands are mere inches apart, a world holds its breath...

Fuck that.

SSSSSSPPPPPPPOOOOOOOOOOOOOOIIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNNNGGGGGGGG


The Rev Owen leaves in a whirl of flailing limbs. He lands and is a pile of broken ones.


Which leaves JBR as the winner. Congratulations. I've got Heat magazine on the phone, they want the print rights. A lifetime of opening branches of Somerfield awaits.

Now. How am I to get him down? Ah yes.

Ah, that was brilliant fun, thanks Plissken.

Congrats JBR!

If I can be a little bit critical, today clearly didn't have the interest up in the same way that days 2 & 3 did. I just don't think those questions were enough to get us arguing. Shame, because it means the big judging day was a bit silent all round. Top fun though.

Yeah baby! Should I have said "I will now be (virtually, if you like, from the game's point of view) mostly at the Brit Beer Festival"? Beer fest for the win, oh yes.

Thanks Plissken - that was fun, and a good change from the normal *scum games, though I'm not sure how well we all got into it - a different theme each day was great for those left, but also made for some disjointedness.