Game -Lego Star Wars Pre Launch 19th March 2011

Another lovely sunny day and off we went to the Metrocentre, Ian, me and R2 to do a days trooping for the Lego Star Wars launch in Game. Rolling R2 through to the shop was fun, and noisy! Not many shoppers around but those that were there gave us some strange looks. Arriving at ‘Game’ we took over the back end of the shop with bodies and kit, the staff in Game are great, always welcoming and happy for our presence, James from Dreamflight was already there with his pot for collection, shame he had to stay inside the shop though, but that’s the Council for you!

A couple of new faces (for me) and nice to see old faces, not that I’m saying they’re old but you know what I mean! after much squeezing past each other, getting in the staff’s way and constantly setting the alarm off on the door, we finally got ready, squashed up into two rooms and the disabled loo, but we made it and out we went to scare, oops, did I say scare? ‘entertain’ the shoppers and drag them willingly into Game and hopefully they’d drop some money into James’ pot. A couple of quiet moments but mostly a busy day for us all and there were quite a few of us, it’s been a great turn out for Game. I’ve never had so many Blackberries thrust into my hands to take photo’s, young girls asking for pics with Stormtroopers and they shoved 3 of them at me, what, do I look like an Octopus? Quite funny when one young girl asked could she have her photo taken with the…………TIN MAN????? That’s a new one for the Stormies!

Come lunchtime we all took off into the direction of That’s Entertainment stopping only to terrorise the poor Pokemon who was there advertising…Pokemon!! Finally we arrived at That’s Entertainment to see Craig who we’d promised we’d go so he can get a few photo’s, we did have fun taking over the front of the shop for 5 minutes before returning to base, only stopping for a Promo Photo taken by a Metrocentre Employee and the usual stoppages of course (hope we get to see this up somewhere).

And as the afternoon comes to a close, I’ve no idea how much was raised, but we all had a great day, managing again to blog up the back of the shop while we all got changed and headed off for a much deserved cuppa and chill.

Thanks to all those who turned up to Troop and Crew today, it’s been great fun and look forward to seeing you all at the next one..

Who Ray Pancake Day - Stockton - 8th March

Stockton Council organised a Pancake race on the High Street, Who Ray shop entered a Team, that turned out to be us from the 99th Garrison, Nigel knew, but we had no idea, well, Craig said he had a 'guess' I however was oblivious, so having arrived at the Who Ray shop on a very cold but bright sunny day, we were told we'd be racing and tossing pancakes! After a brief chat with Brian and Martin, owners of Who Ray, we got changed and headed up to the High Street. In between all this chat, I also discovered Tyne Tees TV were going to be filming this event 'gulp' hadn't expected to be in a race, never mind on TV too! Nigel really must stop hiding the true facts of what we are facing!

Having got up to the high street, we were met by the public and of course the place we were running, all set out with 4 lanes, each with two Toss Points! We signed out disclaimers with much amusement as we listened to the commentator call the first race, Darth Vader, now then, Darth Vader? huh? We had  no Vader, what we did have was SatNige (I'll explain this later) the message was passed along about who he was but he never got it, so Nigel was Vader for the morning! The race started with Nigel going first, off he went with style, hard going in his outfit, he was a grand tosser I have to say, he did well, but at a disadvantage with his helmet and tubing etc. My turn next, running alongside 3 other women who all had trainers on, there was I in my Mara Jade outfit, boots, shin pads, holster etc, I was quite impressed with myself, pipped at first place by .20th of a second, not bad eh? And last but by no means least went Craig, our Stormtrooper 3......2.....1 and off he went ohhh so gently, no galloping run for him, he got to the first Toss Point, stopped and did the most magnificently stylish Toss, by this time I was in fits of giggles, as was everyone else, off he went stopping and tossing, even managing to play to the crowd, giving a wave, doubled his time but he had to score top points for sheer style ,the best tosser there. We did come last but for taking park we were presented with a cheque for £100 pounds which on behalf of Who Ray is going to Dreamflight.

And after all that, off we went to get changed and head over to the Cafe for a much needed snack and hot drink to thaw out, it was freezing! Martin and Brian from Who Ray have asked us to return for a midweek troop sometime in April/May and also hoping to have us back in August for the Stockton Riverside Festival

SatNige, it does need an explanation, it was far funnier in Craig's car than trying to explain it, but it goes like this 'Nigel, which way now'...erm...erm.....erm.. Right, this as Craig was ON the roundabout, 'bit more notice next time Nige' and then we got, 'that way' bearing in mind Nigel was in the back of the car and neither of us knew which way 'that way' was meant to be, poor Nigel, he took it in good fun, as it was  meant to be, but we did burst out laughing every time he gave us a direction.. sorry Nigel, but it really was funny..like I say, you had to be there, and I've no doubt SatNige is going to kill me slowly and painfully for this...sorrreeeee

A great day had by all of us all and looking forward to that return visit or two.