Chapter 18

The Sun had taken it's annual roulette challenge in London and, this year, had settled on one week at the tail end of March. To make the most of this, Dail was indulging in one of his secret pleasures; donning a pair of headphones, grabbing a book and a notebook, then spending his day off on the top step of Nelsons Column. Whenever someone informed him that they hadn't tried this, Dail was always supersonic in recommending it.

Trafalgar Square was a space seemingly designed with people watching fimly at the core of it's design brief. It was also the reason that he had brought a notebook with him (that and lest he be 'caught short', so to speak, when stricken with sudden book inspiration). He enjoyed noting the varying techniques that people (let's face it, 'tourists') employed in mounting the Trafalgar Square lions; a phrase which Dail acknowledged the bizarrity of to anyone not overly familiar with London landmarks. He eventually managed to compile the following compilation of complicated cavortings:

Solo Efforts

• The Run Up Most commonly attempted by bravadic men or tragically over enthusiastic children.
• One Foot On The Tail and followed by trying to swing the other leg up to gain leverage. Possible if you're an Olympic gymnast or contortionist.
• Two Feet On The Tail & two hands on the spine. Jump and lift. The mark of a sound, logical mind - though not always successful.
• Flank The Lion! Attempt to climb the hind legs. Poor planning. Sign of stupidity. Also includes shimmying round the side of the lion onto the pedestal. Most return once there, sensing futility.

Team Efforts

• The Friendly Bum Push Climber usually adopts one of the 'foot and tail' techniques and is then pushed up from beneath. Success depends on the strength of the pusher. Also, to some extent, the size of the bum and it's owner.
• Foot Lift Climber adopts the 'One Foot On The Tail' position. Pusher then cups hands and pushes climbers spare foot to lift. Important climber locks knees or at least helps push back.

It was also interesting to just watch the various poses for photos that people used; though this was not something constrained solely to Trafalgar Square and the column. Dail's personal favourite, clichéd though it was, being The Philosopher. As if the sight of the column had triggered some deep, internal, philosophical quandary within the poser. 

Choosing which side of the statue to sit on was also important to Dail. His preference was the West or East sides. The roar of traffic on one side and the splashing of the fountains on the other which, under perfect conditions, sent over a brilliant and buttock clenchingly refreshing mist.

Then there was the 'Pop Game'. Whilst this was possible anywhere, the crowds generated by this kind of weather made the conditions ideal for it's deployment. The premise was worryingly simple considering the return it gave: pick a person at random. Anyone. Next, imagine or actually make a 'Pop' noise. At that exact moment, visualise your marks head turning into something. Literally anything. One woman's head had turned into a baby from the neck down so that both the baby and woman had an upside-down body for a head. The woman then fell over and had her baby head run amok - dragging her ragdoll body about behind it. Other standards included beachballs, balloons and goldfish bowls (complete with fish). It was a bizarre statistic that most of the good ones began with a 'b'. The next level up, in terms of 'Pop Game' proficiency, was to be able to maintain each transformation and to keep track of each person. To this end it was often a good idea to initially select people who were in some way distinctive from the crowd; be it a brightly coloured t-shirt or wholly unusual hat. After a while you ended up with a crowd of tourists interspersed with people who had all manner of things in place of their heads. Most would just carry on their usual business as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened at all. How little they knew, the fools.

So far, Dail had been in the square for about three hours; alternating between listening to music, listening to the square, and playing the pop game (as well as compiling his Encyclopaedia of Lion Scalers. He'd even got some drawing down, even if it was just a crude depiction of Nelsons Column with his exact location on the steps circled and marked "Happy Place". However, he suddenly realise that he also hadn't moved for three hours, which was significant for two reasons. Firstly, it meant that he hadn't actually eaten anything since breakfast seven hours ago and his stomach was doing its best to silently berate him of the subject. It was only a matter of time before its protests became verbal. Secondly, it meant that his bum was beginning to ache - as three hours spent nestled on hard stone is prone to doing to the untrained backside. And yet, he still wasn't moving. The Sun was still squatting over the rooftops and was due to make a strong return again tomorrow. But tomorrow was Thursday, a day which Dail had inconveniently scheduled in sitting in a dreary, overheated (it was still only march, after all, and the office thermostat was vigilantly narrow-minded) and thoroughly under windowed office. So there was no way in hell that some hunger or posterial discomfort was going to deprive Dail of at least one more hour of unprecedented sunshine. That and he had to still be there lest any of the friends he had text saying "In Trafalgar Square. Come chill out and have a chin-wag." actually replied. Of course, he has limited his pool of selected friends to receive this invitation to those who worked in central London and might be finishing soon. So far, however, nobody had bitten. And, thus, another waiting game commenced. So, to kill the time until hope of friends was abandoned and salvation finally came to both stomach and bum, Dail tracked the movements  of a man in a yellow t-shirt whose head he had metamorphosised into an oversized, but very green, roasted pistachio nut.

"Brilliant."