Chalky, Shirt, and Tigger…

…Meet Tommy The Great Sontaran Mathematician.

Seventh Galaxy had announced a signing for the first in a line of budget-priced DVDs – “The Sontaran Experiment”. Shirt was interested, particularly as one of the offered guest stars had been in both the Douglas Wilmer “Sherlock Holmes” (luckily one of the two available on video) and the “Young Sherlock” TV series. However, the addition of Barrie Ingham, who whilst being a star of the first Peter Cushing Dalek Movie and a guest star in “The Mythmakers”, was also the vocal talent behind Disney’s Sherlockian rodent, Basil the Great Mouse Detective, meant that Shirt would have had to have been physically restrained not to attend. Dufus was not well enough to attend, but Chalky decided to forget such things as looming mortgages, and accompany Shirt.

As the days went by, more guests were added, until finally the signing had been labelled “Doctor Who Day 2” – added to the above were Rory Jennings (Tommy in “The Idiot’s Lantern”), Ben Aaronovitch (writer of classic WHO stories, “Remembrance of the Daleks” and “Battlefield”), Simon Guerrier (Large Endings writer) and Matthew Waterhouse (Adric). The latter caused squeals of delight from Enigma, until she realised that she was working.

Therefore, it was Chalky, Shirt, and making a rare return to signings, Tigger, that met at Waterloo Station (the fact that Chalky was a few minutes late, being nothing to do with the presence of his wife – honest!). Having zoomed along on the Jubilee Line, and just missed a C2C train at West Ham, the three finally made it to Seventh Galaxy. Leaving Tigger in the queue, the two entered the shop, joining a small queue to buy the requisite items. This queue moved slowly due to confusion over payments for additional items and the shop having only one (very slow) credit-card machine. Behind them fans were frantically swapping “Battles in Time” cards as if their lives depended on it, crowing over the rare cards that they had.

Finally rejoining Tigger, the friends settled in for the long haul, constantly distracted by the mumbling of a compere of a nearby search for a child model. Tigger went away, returning with food. The centre was filled with the cries of children getting over-excited by Daleks, free face-painting, free balloons, and goody-packs containing such delights as “The Web Planet” DVD covers. Downstairs two make-up artists were desperately trying to drum u business for their demonstration. Then the family in front of the friends mysteriously upped-and-left just before the queue showed signs of starting to move.

Finally at just after 12pm, the queue did start moving. The friends were concerned that they were in a prime position to be the people stopped by the lunchbreak. However, within 45 minutes they were being ushered into the shop, leaving Tigger outside. First up were the two authors, with Chalky getting his “Remembrance of the Daleks” cover signed and Shirt his “The Eighties” by Ben Aaronovitch, and both getting Simon Guerrier’s moniker on “The Settling”.

Next up was Barrie Ingham. Having forgotten his “Basil The Great Mouse Detective” cover (much to Tigger’s chagrin), Chalky got his “The Mythmakers” photo (the promoted item) and Dalek movie cover signed. Moving on, Shirt was allowed to pounce on one of his idols. The photo signed, Shirt produced his “Basil” DVD cover. Mr. Ingham seemed surprisingly delighted to see it, and was taken aback that Shirt knew that it was him. Having shown it to the other guests, prompting a “I didn’t know that was him. I’d better get his autograph, my son loves that film” from Ben Aaronovitch, he began slowly signing the cover.

“It was originally released as ‘The Great Mouse Detective’ “, he told Shirt, who unsurprisingly already knew this, “but they added the Basil to indicate that it was based on the ‘Basil of Baker Street’ books”.

Shirt mumbled assent, thinking that the books weren’t that famous, and then got Barrie’s autograph on his Dalek movies DVD.

Moving on to the two “Sontaran Experiment” actors, Shirt whispered to Chalky, “Which one is this ?”

“Donald Douglas”, answered Chalky, having already got his cover signed, as Shirt struggled to get his “Young Sherlock” DVD boxset from his bag.

Mr. Douglas seemed equally impressed with Shirt bringing something obscure, but needed reminding that Guy Henry had played Holmes. The queue backing up, Shirt decided not to get his Wilmer cover signed also. Next was Brian Ellis, who signed the DVD, Chalky’s video cover and Shirt’s “The Seventies” (as he appears in two stories in the seventies).

Looking surprisingly relaxed, next up was Rory Jennings, who happily signed three copies of “I, Davros” (one for Dufus) in which he plays the younger self of the crippled dictator, Chalky’s 2007 Annual and Shirt’s Series 2 Poster. Moving right along, and two photos and two covers signed by Matthew Waterhouse later, and the two were leaving the shop to rejoin Tigger, Shirt struggling not to drop all his items. A look at the time and they decided not to dash back to Croydon for a signing by Series 3 (and Tardisodes) writer, Gareth Roberts.

After a leisurely perusal of the shops in Barking, they finally caught a train back to Croydon, where a brief pop into the local library revealed a TARDIS, and Chalky bought an overpriced “Chip and Cassandra” action figure pack with a voucher that he had been given by one of the children at his school at the end of the previous term for Debenhams. The group then wended their way to Chalky and Tigger’s for the first episode of new Saturday evening family entertainment “Robin Hood” and various games that Shirt had bought Chalky for his birthday a month before.

[PL]