Untold Tales From A West Reading Comic Collectors Community - Part 6: The Deal of the Decade!
UNTOLD TALES FROM A WEST READING COMIC COLLECTORS’ COMMUNITY
Part Six: The Deal of the Decade
In the previous parts, we have seen how my companion and mate, Andy D, and I increased our radius from home as we ventured further on our bikes, leaving no stone unturned in search of the American Marvel; and how any likely commercial outlet was considered - apart from food stores (pointless) and porn shops (because we were too young and they wouldn’t let us in).
Not quite as successful as your run of the mill newsagents where we’d often find back issues resurrected from dusty warehouses and sold as new, we would occasionally unearth some gems in second-hand shops. All too common in those days, these establishments and their less than charismatic owners seemed to have dwindled if not disappeared over time. I guess they evolved into the ubiquitous charity shops which have, following the tenets of Darwinism, multiplied extensively. Like coffee shops. Must be in their Jeans. Like Joe.
So, we now have far more charity shops than we ever had second shops then. But at least they are so much more pleasant, practically perfect in every way that a seventies second hand shop on the Oxford Road (West Reading’s main east-west arterial route) was not. Cleaner, brighter, tidier, better stock. Much more pleasant than their predecessors which were uniformly dark, dingy, crusty and full of depressing tat. Plastic plates, assorted, chipped mugs, broken unmatching chairs. An orphanage of mixed cutlery. And their owners, whatever happened to them? Did they evolve, too? Well, given they seemed to be universally unsociable caricatures of Dickensian villains and the living embodiment of flawed genetics, I figure they became those undead hoarders you see on TV programs about house clearances.
Disclaimer: We apologize again for the fault in the content. Those responsible for sacking the people who have just been sacked have been sacked.
Let’s get back to our unfolding saga. Here then are the front runners, the founding fathers of the WRCCC:
Andy D – biking bud; not so much brain as ear-wax.
Joe G – my collecting partner. Matt Haig, in his novel called The Humans (a truly wonderful, sci-fi-ish, life affirming story, highly recommended) says: “If you think something is ugly, look harder. Ugliness is just a failure of seeing.” He obviously never saw Joe. A wise man knows when to reconsider.
Andy W – he came, he saw, we seldom traded. The tough mudder of all tough customers.
Andy T – he was small, he was noisy, he was Robin to AW’s Batman.
Winston H – our very own Walter Mitty, though black and blue-eyed, always in search of but never found a free lunch.
Jerry H – seldom seen, scarcer than a Northern Hairy Nosed Wombat. Had a big smile.
Michael W – a bar steward of ultimate stupidity that we collectively hurled into the fires of hell for nicking a pile of my most valuable comics (luckily, I got ‘em all back).
Alexander H – a founding father but nothing to do with the community. He died then went on to play Lee Scoresby in His Dark Materials. He died in that too. A wise man knows when to reconsider.
Inappropriate moment: if the answer is cock Robin, what is the question?
There’s more. Beyond our community, we also have various school mates worthy of a mention:
Tim S – “There Are Those Who Call Me... Tim”, meek school mate and Marvel geek emeritus.
Tim L – the son of Daddy Warbucks, dentally challenged in ways that put Shane MacGowan to shame. If you do doubt your courage or your strength, come no further, for death awaits you all with nasty, big, pointy teeth.
Alf W – killed thousands by flatulence when his ear holes turned to arseholes and shat on his shoulders.
However, we are still not done with the introductions of our players. There are two more remaining. One is Mark K, a willing adversary in the Deal of The Decade, which we will shall talk about in a short while. The other is Ivor E, another bit player, who lived further up the town end of the Oxford Road than anyone else, beyond the railway bridge and thus arguably beyond West Reading. But we shall be generous in the same way that it has been extended in my direction; that I, a native of the Tilehurst fringes, can also consider myself a member of the same community.
Being one of our youngest members and thus easily influenced, Ivor was our sacrificial virgin to brutally disadvantage and despoil on the altar of unfair trade. In other words, for the fellow hardball partnership of Andies W and T (AW and AT), and likewise for me, he was our beeyatch. It didn’t take much effort to fleece him from his good comics in exchange for our unwanted B listers like Subbies and Iron Men.
Lady Macbeth: too full o’ th’ milk of human kindness.
- C. Fields (with licence): it's morally wrong to allow a sucker to keep his comics.
Peter Gabriel: he's getting out the marrow in your backbone.
Less than ten years later, AW became Ivor’s neighbour in an ill-fated basement flat, the ceiling of which collapsed one a harsh winter in the early eighties. Back then, you see, we could get a good nine inches. Regularly. Like Custer’s last stand, but without the arrows sticking out of it.
[Wait for applause to die down]
Wayne: Not!
Garth: Schwing!
Some pipes froze over in the building’s loft and, when they thawed, the resulting deluge brought the plaster down. It was a mess. In sympathy, I was tempted to lend him a copy of my then-fiancé’s book she had kept from childhood called The Day the Ceiling Fell Down by Jenifer Wayne. But she disapproved. Thought it was insensitive. We got married a couple of years later.
Groucho: marriage is a wonderful institution, but who wants to live in an institution?
The road on which AW and Ivor lived was a short one and quite steep. At the lower end was the Oxford Road and various chip shops. At the other end, on the opposite side of the adjoining street which it ran perpendicularly into, lay The Rose & Thistle pub. This was a handy haunt to escape the damp confines of his flat and seek a pleasant pint or two in convivial surroundings. It went on to become a regular pit stop for quite a few years afterwards and has been an occasional watering hole ever since.
Back then, on those Monday nights down the pub, we were often joined by Dave H, entirely uninvited and usually a sheet to the wind by this point in the evening. He had nothing whatsoever to do with collecting comics, didn’t play a musical instrument and was a sandwich short of a picnic. His younger brother, brighter, similarly unattractive but with more Irish teeth, went on to die prematurely a few years later, in unkempt bachelor loneliness after a failed marriage to the wrong girl. He was the first to go from our extended group of town centre pub buddies, which started to evolve at the end of this saga (when making music, drinking and womanising became unhappy bed fellows with comic collecting). A few more mates have gone since. Pretty much all for the same reason: living life too hard, too much drink, too many fags, too many drugs. But we did have some bloody good times. That’s a different story.
Before I move on, I must mention Andy B. He was another who departed too early, also a guitarist and first of our group to work out the solo from Another Brick in the Wall. He went by way of being a capable musician and good with the ladies, via research chemist at BP then a full-time night club owner to a clinical depressive in an institution. Coincidently, his sister partnered mine when they were younger in a ballet dancing duet. I now have an ingrained hatred of Me and My Shadow and We Are A Couple of Swells. I think this might have had more of an effect on Andy B.
Finally, in regards Dave H, for a long, long time we went under the misapprehension that he had a very skilled job in a car part manufacturing business. The plant is still an ongoing concern, quite near where I live, so it has had to have been quite a haul for him to commute by bike every day over the decades in every weather from various bedsits close to the town centre. One Monday, many years later, he let slip what he really did in that factory, much to our shock. It turned out that it was mind-numbingly, almost incomprehensibly dull, that he observed gearboxes and the like as they emerged suspended on rails from a processing machine. That was it. Just stood and watched. All day. Every day. Memory fades as to what the machine exactly did – maybe cleaned them or painted them. Memory also fades as to why he did this. But it was nothing hugely important. Of that, I am sure. And it was surely nothing as impressive as imaging him feeling fulfilled as he solemnly watched gearbox after gearbox go by. I guess someone has to get paid to do it. Probably cheaper than a computer.
Was it no wonder how desperately drunk he became those Monday nights after a very large intake of Stella? Apparently, he repeated this consumption most nights of the week. In company. Alone. In some other pubs too, but mostly the Rose. And it went on for decades. We would occasionally bump into him over the years that followed. He still had the same job, still consumed the same poison in the same volumes. Only recently has he had to cut it out when it all caught up with him. Doctor’s orders. No moderation. Zero tolerance. Let that be a lesson for you, kiddies.
He is one of the lucky survivors. As far as I know, most of us comic collectors have thrived in somewhat better health, without becoming drug addicts or alcoholics. May you rest in peace, mum, but I think time has proven I now have a strong argument that comics are not bad for you.
Blessed are the geek: for they shall inherit the earth.
Back to our story and ironically, deflowered as he was, Ivor went on to collect almost entire runs of both Sub-Mariner and Iron Man. He was also one of the few from the community that would journey with Andy D and me in a few months’ time to the London marts, of which at this point in our story we had no inkling. But these marts would become the source of the grail in our quest. These would be the nuclear fires that would stoke our collections. Our big bang.
First shalt thou take out the Holy Pin. Then shalt thou count to three, no more no less. Three shalt be the number thou shalt count, and the number of the counting shalt be three. Four shalt thou not count, neither count thou two, excepting that thou then proceed to three. Five is right out. Once the number three, being the third number, be reached, then lobbest thou thy Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch towards thou foe, who being naughty in my sight, shall snuff it.
In this first half of 1975, deals were prolific amongst the members of our burgeoning collective of collectors. One of the biggest perils, a rather unpleasant encounter that was much more prevalent in those days, was the water-logged and consequently brittle comic. Often these were quite tempting imports, and oddly often early Marvel Team Ups, but their condition all but wrote them off as undesirable unless they happened to be a particularly interesting or scarce item, like Spider-Man 121 and the death of Gwen Stacy. In fact, that particular comic was very rare. A lot like seeing Jerry H. But, unlike Jerry who had a very cheery disposition and chubby Caribbean demeanour, a very forlorn copy of this issue had found its way into our group. Despite its scarcity, needless to say, it was so hideously leprous that it didn’t change hands much.
Note one: lepers should not play poker... in case they throw their hands in.
Note two: lepers should not attend comedy shows… in case they laugh their heads off.
Disclaimer: We apologize again for the fault in the content. Those responsible for sacking the people who have just been sacked have lost their heads. They are pretty ‘armless, too. And that’s really not ‘andy!
Black Knight: 'Tis but a scratch.
Arthur: A scratch? Your arm's off!
Our understanding was these blighted, wrinkly rags came over as consignments in ships’ ballast, being repurposed discards from the US. In other words: bilge rot. They were regarded with the second lowest level of disdain, the worst being, ugh, the coverless comic. There, I have said it. Blasphemy!
Demon: what an excellent day for an exorcism.
Coverless comics ranked as the lowest of the low, but they were luckily few and far between. Unfortunately, at some point I ended up with a coverless Thor 156 (thanks Joe), which I could never shift when I came to sell up. Ended up throwing it away. Even today, with the likes of eBay, I doubt I could sell it, despite trying to pull the wool and claiming that it was FN or VFN, as most optimistic sellers seem to deem their wretched specimens. [Woke checker recommendation: specipersons]
Slightly less repugnant, another all too common blight back then was the taped spine, a more practiced occurrence than today. I guess we had a thing for sticky tape (ta Blue Peter).
Valerie Singleton: Here’s one I made earlier.
Black Knight: Just a flesh wound.
Disgruntled collector: I don’t want to trade with you no more, you empty-headed animal food trough wiper. I fart in your general direction. Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries.
In our little consortium of like-minded, unapologetic Marvelites, perhaps the best deal ever from my perspective was that with Mark K. We two seldom traded, being that he was more a friend of Andy T and Andy W. By the way, yes, you are right, there are quite a few Andies in this tale, what with Andy D and Andy B as well. Outside of our circle, I knew enough to make up an entire South American mountain range, way more than ten over that short span of years - go figure. Clue: The Royal Family.
Anyhow, this particular trade took a long time to settle though not quite on the magnitude of Brexit. It extended over the course of an afternoon, and in my rather small bedroom rather than Brussels, with all three Andies (DWT) and Ivor crammed in with us, close enough to spark a viral surge and that Brussels could rightly criticise for breaching health and safety regs. The target of Mark’s desire was my hallowed Silver Surfer 15, a comic I never thought I would trade. The main protagonists, or facilitators as we’d say today, were the two Andies (WT). I suspect the Andy partnership were eager to see the deal go ahead, because they figured they could then get it off Mark. He was known as an easy target, often willing to sacrifice his older and more collectible items for the most common and recent of issues.
Of course, I was genuinely reluctant to surrender one of my most favourite ever comics. So, after hard negotiations that almost pale every peace accord ever agreed, I finally capitulated. Mark walked off with my Surfer as I thumbed through a dozen comics, all imports, their sum value far, far exceeding that of my comic. Winter’s long march has taken its toll but, as I recall, they included a few Avengers, Defenders and very early, not water-logged Team Ups. Better yet, with no concessions to fishing rights. Best of all, Mark held onto this most sanctified of comics and it never made its way into the hands of the Ands.
The frog was a prince, the prince was a brick, the brick was an egg, the egg was a bird,
Hadn't you heard? They're going to change you into a human being!
Yes, we're happy as fish and gorgeous as geese,
And wonderfully clean in the morning.
For all of our rivalry, one of our better moments of cooperation was when we cooked up a plan to try and clean out Andy D. We became like Europe trying to discredit a vaccination program.
Joker: Ever danced with the Devil by the pale moonlight?
Darth: You underestimate the power of the Dark Side.
Pennywise: I'm every nightmare you've ever had. I'm your worst dream come true. I'm everything you ever were afraid of.
The thing with Andy was he had the luck of the Irish and a habit of picking up real neat comics at very good prices. He was the first of our group to get two of those beautiful Steranko Caps, 110 and 113. But he also managed to acquire a very early Hulk, around issue 3 as I remember. Boy oh boy, when he triumphantly rubbed that in our faces, were the rest of us as green as that Hulk? Yes, we were.
So, the plan was this: how do we get AD to reconsider the importance of his comics, that they were of lesser value and thus more eligible as cannon-fodder? The answer was by pretending to do deals between us for DCs because, * ahem * DCs were the new currency. After all, they had neat artists like Neal Adams and Bernie Wrightson and Batman was always as cool as Supes was not. But, to give him credit, even though he had the mental capacity of a marshmallow, he didn’t fall for it. Instead, we managed to convince him that Captain America was his best focus and so the trading began for his other titles once more. And dammit to hell, the two Andies beat me to it, even though and probably because Andy D and I were close friends, and they got that Hulk off him.
Bob the builder: Can we fix it?
Narrator: OFFS, Bob. Bog off. Your birth certificate was an apology letter from the condom factory and you’re so full of excreta, your toilet is jealous.
The biggest thorn for our Andy pair was their constant inability to get any comics off my partner Joe. I had strongly advised Joe to stay clear of them and this he did with great relief. Joe still managed to get some good deals with the other members and our little collection grew. My first dated and complete stock take was on June 2, with my half of the collection consisting of 195 US Marvels.
Around this time, I had seen an ad for forthcoming comic marts in London that June and August, probably in the MWOM. Now here was a dream come true. Better than Jeannie (yet another unapologetic pop culture reference to something long forgotten). Ain’t that right, JR (ditto, connected, and probably less forgotten).
As the first date of June 7th approached, the excitement was palpable… or pulpable, even… and the anticipation immense, almost like that of a six-year child on Christmas Eve. In the end, only Andy D and I went together to that first one. The two other Andies also attended separately though this was going to be their only sojourn to our capital for such an event.
Excuses from the rest in our community were varied. For instance, Winston had seen this tenner on the pavement but it had blown away just as he reached out for it, hence his inability was unsurprisingly financial. In retrospect, I figure no one else had parents quite as accommodating as ours so the majority were not allowed. In truth, they were generally younger than us. Outside from Joe, Andy D and I were the oldest by a few months, both 14 going on 15 with our birthdays being a couple of months later and just a handful of days apart in August. Andy W was half a year younger and acted as chaperone to Andy T, who lagged us by a couple of years. Given that the trip involved taking a train from Reading Station to Paddington then, without putting it back (sorry, couldn’t resist that old chestnut), finding our way to somewhere in Westminster, I guess many of their parents were reluctant. Don’t forget, either, that we were a couple of decades from the invention of the mobile phone, so we were also entirely contactless and untraceable.
How lucky were we, huh? Would any parent today even remotely countenance such an idea?
When the day finally arrived, off we set on foot, walking just over two miles to the station to avoid wasting a few pennies on bus fare. After all, this was the cost of a comic. What’s more, after a pretty cold snap over the previous days where the lows approached freezing, the weather had done a U-turn more dramatic than any leader facing an evolving crisis over a rampant virus, and a behatted sun now bathed us amidst very pleasant temperatures, reaching the mid-twenties that afternoon. Such a crazy swing had only been experienced in the country three times previously over the last 100 years. Anyone for global warming? Whilst burying your head firmly in the sand?
Greta: The eyes of all future generations are upon you. And if you choose to fail us, I say - we will never forgive you.
Barack Obama: Just shut up and get out of the way.
Pennywise: Stop now before I kill you.
Actually, we went on to have a decent summer that year, though of course nothing close to the melt-fest we would undergo the following one.
Feel your body melt,
Mum to mud to mad to dad,
Dad diddley office, Dad diddley office,
Marvels, want them all.
Dad to dam to dumb to mum,
Mum diddley washing, Mum diddley washing,
Marvels, want them all.
In preparation for our day out, AD and I had taken sandwiches with us for sustenance and we scoffed these on the train. They were, after all, our staple midday fare. We had them for lunch every week day at school, both of us having tasted the canteen when we first started at secondary. That not so fine-dining experience did not last long. Invariably, the swill they served usually ended up on the ceiling to which it adhered all rather too willingly, clingier than Nazgul dogging a ring bearer.
Pity then, though, the borders, those refugees offloaded as term time residents by their parents, many of whom served or worked abroad. Not only did these scholarly inmates have to suffer the strictures imposed by the Presentation Brothers, the quasi-Nazi group of sadistic monks that comprised a percentage of the teaching staff and ran the school with metaphorical rods of iron augmented by physical lengths of hosepipe or large bunches of keys (if you recall the latter two made fine weapons of mass torture and provided deviant, suppressed Freudian pleasure), but they had to survive on these dregs that were unfit for consumption by any species, living, dead, walking or slithering. It didn’t take long to recognise a market potential and carve myself a small-scale lucrative niche by selling to the hungry hordes my surplus sandwiches, Jacob’s (if you like a lot of chocolate on your biscuit, join our) Clubs, (p-p-p-pick up a) Penguins or exceedingly good cakes.
Actually, rather than hordes, it was more like the two or three Oliver Twists usually found in each class. But these wretches were eager and willingly forked out a few pence each for the fare, which my mum happily and unknowingly donated, being led to believe that her son had a monstrous appetite.
Mrs. Doyle: There's always time for a nice cup of tea. Sure, didn't the Lord himself pause for a nice cup of tea before giving himself up for the world.
Father Ted: No, he didn't, Mrs Doyle.
Mrs. Doyle: Well, whatever the equivalent they had for tea in those days, cake or something. And speaking of cake, I have cake.
[She holds up a cupcake]
Father Ted: No, thanks, Mrs. Doyle.
Mrs. Doyle: Are you sure, Father? There's cocaine in it.
Father Ted: WHAT?
Mrs. Doyle: Oh, no, not cocaine. God, what am I on about? No, what d'you call them. Raisins.
The small amount of cash I took with me to the mart that day mostly came from my saved-up pocket money, though it was slightly bolstered by the purchases from those unfortunate wraiths at school. Thus, our individual fortunes came to about five pounds each. Furthermore, as mentioned, we had saved some by walking to the station rather than getting the bus (it was unheard of back then that those scarce daddy dears who actually owned cars would give their kids a lift).
TJ: But you know, we were happy in those days, though we were poor.
MP: Aye. BECAUSE we were poor. My old Dad used to say to me, 'Money doesn't buy you happiness.'
EI: 'E was right. I was happier then and I had NOTHIN'. We used to live in this tiiiny old house, with greaaaaat big holes in the roof.
GC: House? You were lucky to have a HOUSE! We used to live in one room, all hundred and twenty-six of us, no furniture. Half the floor was missing; we were all huddled together in one corner for fear of FALLING!
TJ: You were lucky to have a ROOM! *We* used to have to live in a corridor!
MP: Ohhhh, we used to DREAM of livin' in a corridor! Woulda' been a palace to us. We used to live in an old water tank on a rubbish tip. We got woken up every morning by having a load of rotting fish dumped all over us! House!? Hmph.
EI: Well, when I say 'house' it was only a hole in the ground covered by a piece of tarpaulin, but it was a house to US.
GC: We were evicted from *our* hole in the ground; we had to go and live in a lake!
TJ: You were lucky to have a LAKE! There were a hundred and sixty of us living in a small shoebox in the middle of the road.
MP: Cardboard box?
TJ: Aye.
MP: You were lucky. We lived for three months in a brown paper bag in a septic tank. We used to have to get up at six o'clock in the morning, clean the bag, eat a crust of stale bread, go to work down mill for fourteen hours a day week in-week out. When we got home, our Dad would thrash us to sleep with his belt!
GC: Luxury. We used to have to get out of the lake at three o'clock in the morning, clean the lake, eat a handful of hot gravel, go to work at the mill every day for tuppence a month, come home, and Dad would beat us around the head and neck with a broken bottle, if we were LUCKY!
TJ: Well, we had it tough. We used to have to get up out of the shoebox at twelve o'clock at night, and LICK the road clean with our tongues. We had half a handful of freezing cold gravel, worked twenty-four hours a day at the mill for fourpence every six years, and when we got home, our Dad would slice us in two with a bread knife.
EI: Right. I had to get up in the morning at ten o'clock at night, half an hour before I went to bed, drink a cup of sulphuric acid, work twenty-nine hours a day down mill, and pay mill owner for permission to come to work, and when we got home, our Dad and our mother would kill us, and dance about on our graves singing 'Hallelujah.'
MP: But you try and tell the young people today that... and they won't believe ya.
The most significant element of our outlay was the train fare at around 50p for a return. And to further protect my pennies and make sure I wasn’t going to get ripped off, I had a handwritten synopsis of prices, covering my areas of interest. It was meticulously copied from Alan Austin’s Comic Book Price Guide, borrowed from a friend at school who had acquired it from fanzine Fantasy Advertiser. It was 30p, an extravagance none of us in the collective could consider, hence why I had copied out this mini crib sheet. Along with my copious lists of aging stock takes, I still have that single forty-five-year-old page of A4 and drool over what could have been if I was a few years older and wealthier:
Avengers 1 6.00; Captain America 100 0.75; Conan 1 5.00; Daredevil 1 5.00; Defenders 1 1.00;
Fantastic Four 1 30.00, 2 15.00, 3 10.00, 48 0.75; Hulk 102 0.75; Iron Man 1 0.60;
Journey into Mystery 83 8.00; Marvel Feature/Premiere/Team Up 1 each 1.20;
Silver Surfer 1 2.50; Spider-Man 1 20.00, 2 8.00; Strange Tales 101 3.00;
Tales of Suspense 39, Tales to Astonish 27 and X-Men 1 each 5.00.
Dammit. I have some of those but as for the rest, they are so out of reach, commanding four if not five digits.
Dorothy: Toto, I've got a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore.
Morpheus: [Takes out two pills, one of which is red, the other of which is blue] This is your last chance. After this there is no turning back. You take the blue pill, the story ends; you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe.
According to my notes on that single sheeted time capsule, grading went from high to low as M, NM, VG, G, FG, F (fine) and P (poor). Mint was less precious than it is today and values were given for this. There was very little variation in the pricing between grades, nowhere near the scaling we see today. Being that most comics were listed in the 20p or less range, there wasn’t so much room to manoeuvre. Also, the comics were decades younger so they were generally in far better average condition. In addition, there were no concepts of keys, with prices as previously mentioned dictated by availability, artist and age. If anything could be considered hot, then it would the Silver Surfer and Conan titles.
Thus armed, ready, and almost high with adrenalin (not raisins), we arrived a quarter of an hour before the mart’s midday start. In those few minutes before they threw open the doors to the Methodist Central Hall, and now joined by the other two Andies, we made a few purchases from fellow collectors on the huge steps of its large antechamber. One figure that was a regular fixture at these events was memorably a Tom Baker fan, wearing a similar coat to that season’s new Doctor Who and festooned with the same scarf of many colours, even though it was rather on the warm side. Disregarding his state of overdress, I was still not impressed, because Jon Pertwee remained my favourite Doctor after those years of having the bejaysus scared out of me whilst I cowered beneath a towel following our once-weekly bath or, if still in an insanitary state, peeking out from behind the fold-down sofa. By the way, this item of furniture also doubled as my mum and dad’s bed whilst they spent four years straddling the start of this decade building an extension, forced into it after I had reached the age of seven and they had to separate my two younger sisters and I into our bungalow’s two sole bedrooms.
TJ: But you know, we were happy in those days, though we were poor.
Lemmy: If there is a God, he hasn't been paying attention. He should retire and hand over to a younger man, because he's making a real bollocks of everything.
At midday on the dot the doors to the mart opened and the hounds of hell were let loose.
Ah-hooo, geeks and nerds of London
Ah-hooo
Ah-hooo, geeks and nerds of London
Ah-hooo
To be continued…
