Shirt...

...Not In Notting-ham.

Shirt had had an idea. Having come across details of EM-Con, a signing event being held in Nottingham, online, he contacted Dufus and they agreed to go together, with Shirt staying with Dufus at his brother’s address just outside Lincoln. However, fate had a hand to play and it proved that "the best laid schemes o' mice an' sci-fi geeks, gang aft agley”, as a short time before the event, Dufus’ doctors decided to see if he could manage without his medication. The answer proved to be “No”, and Dufus found himself being rushed into hospital, and whilst it initially was believed that it would be a short-stay, it became clear that he would not be discharged in time for the convention. Dufus’ family continued to offer hospitality to Shirt, who had already booked his train tickets, and so Shirt made plans for another solo jaunt.

His journey was reasonably uneventful (save seeing Jack Donnelly, ‘Jason’ from ‘Atlantis’ on the train, also on his way to the event) but long, due to there being no trains from Nottingham to Lincoln all weekend. Shirt therefore had to catch a replacement bus service, and on asking a member of railway staff about this, got a wave of the hand in the general direction of the bus stop where he needed to catch the bus, two minutes further down the road. On arriving at the stop, Shirt asked a waiting bus driver, who confirmed that the bus indicated by Shirt was the replacement bus service and would be leaving in twenty minutes. It was only at this point that Shirt noticed the ‘Rail Replacement Service’ livery on the side of the coach.

Winding its way through country lanes, whilst Shirt listened to ‘The Romance of Crime’, after an hour-and-a-half it reached the small station close to Dufus’ brother’s, and Dufus’ brother was there to meet him. After a meal in which Dufus’ sister-in-law struggled to use her new oven, Shirt and Dufus’ brother went to visit Dufus in hospital, where he seemed in good spirits.

On their return, Shirt had taken over Dufus’ bed, and so having cleared various detritus from it, retired early in preparation for the next day’s event.

In the morning after an early breakfast, Dufus’ brother gave Shirt a lift to a railway station where he could pick up a direct bus to Nottingham. On arrival, Shirt made his way to the Arena where the event was taking place, and joined one of the four queues for ‘standard entry’. People kept arriving, and eventually there were six queues. At 11am, the doors opened, and the queues quickly piled into the building. Inside there were a lack of signs, but Shirt eventually pulled open one of the doors to the actual arena, finding the signing area and a number of dealer’s stalls were on the arena floor itself, down a long flight of stairs between the seats. Making his way down to the floor, Shirt decided to check the ‘lie of the land’. First up, and with by far the longest queue (that Shirt found it difficult to navigate around) was Nichelle Nichols, former USS Enterprise communications officer. Further along, was Jack Bence, star of “Bad Education”, as well as three out of the four ‘Boys from the Dwarf’ (Craig Charles being yet to arrive) and both Hollies. Moving around the corner, Shirt found the ‘Atlantis’ area, as well as the ‘Doctor Who’ area featuring Doctors 5-7, Nicola Bryant, Dan Starkey and Jemma Redgrave. Shirt also noted that all guests were charging for posed photos with them at the tables (the charge varying by ‘importance’ of guest).

Moving back round, Shirt began with Jack Bence, who also appeared as ‘Raz’, the graffiti artist in ‘Sherlock’ Series 1 episode, “The Blind Banker”. Jack had only ‘BE’ photos, and so Shirt got him to sign the inside of his “Sherlock – Series 1” DVD cover. He then asked for his first photo of the day, for which Jack came round to the front of the signing table.

Moving on, Shirt moved to the ‘Doctor Who’ area where he got Jemma Redgrave to sign his ‘Series 8’ poster to represent ‘Death In Heaven’. Retracing his steps, he made his way back to the ‘Atlantis’ area, wishing to meet the guests for their ‘Doctor Who’ connections instead. First was Jemima Rooper, who appeared in Large Endings’ “The Company of Friends” as MDW Eighth Doctor comic-strip companion, Izzy Sinclair. Jemima squealed at seeing the cover.

“I haven’t seen this for years”, she commented, signing it next to Lisa Bowerman’s signature.

She then signed Shirt’s precious ‘Companion’ book, before flicking through it marveling at the number of signatures.

“You’re number 66”, said Shirt, possibly a little too proudly, before asking for a photo.

Jemima leapt up and leant as close as she could (not that Shirt was complaining), whilst her steward took the photo.

Next up was Sarah Parish, who was chatting excitedly with the fan in front of Shirt having just learnt that she was responsible for the fansite – Sarah Parish Fans – which the lady herself rated very highly.

“You seem to know everything I’ve done or am going to do, even when I don’t know myself”, Sarah praised, before offering to do an online interview for the site.

Mutual appreciation concluded, and the web-mistress moved off.

Sarah only had ‘Atlantis’ photos, and so signed Shirt’s ‘Series 3’ poster representing “The Runaway Bride”, before posing for the inevitable photo.

Retracing his steps, Shirt made his way to Ryan Sampson, ‘The Sontaran Stratagem/The Poison Sky’ guest-star, but more importantly as far as Shirt was concerned, ‘Grumio’ from ‘Plebs’. He therefore selected a photo of Ryan as Grumio, which Ryan happily signed ‘To Shirt’.

Ryan seemed surprised at the love for ‘Plebs’ that he had been experiencing, and revealed that there is to be a third series, recording later that year for broadcast the next year. The two then chatted about Ryan’s role in the Tim Rice musical of “From Here to Eternity” (also starring Darius from ‘Pop Idol’ and Third/Sixth Doctor stage companion, Rebecca Thornhill), which Shirt had enjoyed on stage the previous year before its run came to a sudden end.

Ryan seemed touched at this enthusiasm for his work, and shook Shirt warmly by the hand, as Shirt bade him farewell.

The next twenty minutes were spent pushing his way through crowds in order to browse stalls, not finding anything that he wished to buy. He therefore made his way back to the corridor running around the building where there were many more stalls. Shirt therefore slowly worked his way around the stalls, still not finding anything that he wanted to buy. He did however try a tombola with several DW prizes, but did not win with any of his three tickets.

Shirt therefore exited the venue, getting his ticket scanned to allow re-entry, where he took photos of various TV vehicles parked outside, including an A-Team van with a scary Mr. T. mannequin in it, looking like the inflatable autopilot from 'Airplane'. Shirt then made his way back to the centre of Nottingham, spending so long looking in shops, that his original plan of watching a film at a nearby cinema to waste time until his train was due had to be abandoned, as he arrived over fifteen minutes after the start-time. He did, however, manage to buy a ‘War Doctor’ action figure from a branch of Naughty Asteroid International, as well as a ‘Sherlock Holmes’ DVD and book set from ‘The Factory’. Having stopped for brief sustenance, he decided to return to the event.

On his return, Shirt found that Ryan, whom he had decided to pay for a photo with, was away from his signing table. Shirt therefore moved up into the stands, sitting in a seat looking down on his signing table. Five minutes later, Ryan returned, but Shirt gave a full minute before making his way down to the table, to ask for a photo.

“Shirt ?”, remembered Ryan, tentatively, before squeezing under the signing table to pose for the photo.

Photo taken and the two continued standing by the table chatting. Ryan was very intrigued by one attendee’s costume, which seemed to be Zelda, but he was carrying a lightsabre. Ryan therefore went and asked, being told that it was a ‘Star Wars’ character that neither he nor Shirt had heard of. With another person wanting Ryan’s autograph, they shook hands again, and Shirt moved around the hoardings to find that Craig Charles was a ‘no-show’, despite some people having been queuing at his empty table for over an hour earlier in the day to be first when he did arrive. Shirt therefore made his way out of the arena, pausing to buy a 3.25” Twelfth Doctor figure, and to buy another set of tombola tickets, this time winning with two of them – an Ewok photo signed by Katie Purvis (‘Maternal Ewok’) and a fridge magnet of ‘Family Guy’s Brian made from Hama Beads.

Leaving for the final time, Shirt wandered around central Nottingham shops, until Sunday early closing meant that he made his way back to the station to wait for his train.

This finally arrived, and Shirt settled back in his seat, again noticing Jack Donnelly on the train (joined by his co-star, Robert ‘Pythagoras’ Emms, and by Danny John Jules). However, even the audio delights of 'The English Way of Death', could not stop him falling asleep, and dreaming of the weekend’s events. Hopefully he and Dufus would be able to go to the next such event together.

[PL]