The start of the blurry night began with a visit to Potters House of Horrors in Surrey. Peggy had wanted to go badly and I was game. Being the ex-horror film aficionado, I thought, ‘How scary could this thing be anyways?’ Well, if I had placed a bet on that, I would’ve lost the house.
Peggy and I got there after prime time, which is after 7pm. That’s when the toned down, Disney-fied “family hour” is over and the real scares begin. Anything goes.
We got in the packed line up to get into the house. To “entertain” the crowd, there would be costumed up zombies, monsters and ghouls that would appear suddenly in the line up, shuffling amongst the crowd. It was jarring to most everyone, as they just come up behind you unexpectedly or come at you to stare you down. And they looked menacing and without any emotions; they don’t break out of character. So lots of nervous giggles.
Not surprisingly, there was just something about me that one monster could not resist. Looking like a mental asylum worker/killer, in his scrubs, with the skin flayed off his face, he hounded me in the line-up (yeah, like THAT’S not my worst nightmare).
Earlier, he had jumped the fencing and scared a group of teen girls in line so badly, that one girl who couldn’t stop crying, couldn’t go any further. So now I was his intended, it seems. I must have a sign on my forehead that said easy target. Perhaps I had drawn his attention, when I took some pictures of him. With nowhere in line that I could go or hide, I just kept my hat over my eyes to avoid eye contact. Well, that was provocation enough, I suppose.
I know now what I do when I get really scared/nervous. I laugh. I laugh to the point that tears come rolling down my eyes. And I can’t stop.
Peggy warned me that Mr Skinless was heading our way. And he was literally cowering over me, breathing down the back of my neck to let me know he was behind me. I could not even look at him while Peggy took a picture. Turns out Mr Skinless had a sense of humour, giving me bunny ears. (although I didn’t know it at the time)
Everyone around me saw what was happening and they laughed at me and with me, probably glad they were not in my position. We were the next ones to go into the house and I just kept wishing that the girl would just take our tickets already. I held out my ticket but skinless grabbed it out of my hand, wanting me to look at him.
After a couple of failed attempts to take my tickets back, (eyes averted), the ticket girl got it from him. Completely breathless now (and unsure if I’d start to hyper-ventilate from the scare and laughs), Peggy and I went into the house.
Potters House of Horrors is a 9,000 square feet labyrinth of scare-the-wits-out-you nightmares, phobias and pop-ups. (computerized animotronics as well as real people in dark corners or hidden in the display that jump out or run after you)
The twisty hallways are no wider than if you were to hold your arms out, hands touching the walls. You’re pretty much in the dark and you’re evenly spaced so there’s no one in front of you nor no one behind you.
There are even emergency exits along the way in case it gets too much for you. with St John’s ambulance paramedics outside, Potters rules advise that the house is not suitable for those who faint easily, have heart conditions, are pregnant or scaredy cats. Plus that you should go to the bathroom before entering the house.
Arm in arm, Peggy and I made our way through the dark and twisty hallways, super relieved when we caught up with a group in front of us. Should have felt like safety in numbers, but not in this case. Fear begets fear. We both screamed and shrieked as ghoulies came out of the walls to frighten us, with one in particular feebly demanding, “Why are you running away from me?”
With no one behind us, and a group in front of us that we couldn’t get by, Peggy felt completely exposed from behind. I know now that if we were ever in a real life horror movie situation, that she’d use me as a human shield. When the costumed actors came rushing at us, Peggy would hide behind me, pushing me into them. Hilarious, non?
And just when we had enough scares and just wanted out, frantically thinking, “Are we there yet?”, we had to ascend this ramp. Good lord. Our last obstacle out of this haunted house was walking across a metal corrugated flooring, while the room spun, vortex-like. this round tube of a room spun at such a velocity that it was dizzying. In a nauseous way.
I held onto the rails in support and walked most of it with my eyes half shut or squinting. I knew my eyes would get all squirrely if I hadn’t done that. Unfortunately, Peggy wasn’t as lucky and almost couldn’t make it through the room. When we both made it out finally, we struggled to walk off the vortex effects for the next few minutes. It was almost as bad as the first few seconds of getting off a tire swing after you’ve been spun round and round.
I don’t even remember the last time I screamed at a horror movie I saw. Potters House of Horrors beat the piss-poor horror movies out there, hands down. Absolutely worth the $12. Walking back to the parking lot, we both breathed a sigh of relief that it was over. My heart can resume beating now.
Our second pit-stop was Sophia’s birthday party downtown. And gotta hand it to Sophia’s husband, Craig on his costume. We’ve known craig for over 10 years now and this would not be a costume we thought he’d come up with! Like a car crash, all of us could not tear our eyes away from Craig looking like he was trying out to become a member of the Village People.
After the birthday, we hit up Lotus nightclub for their legendary Halloween costume party for a few hours, before heading off to a house party not too far away. By 2am, I was done. My bed was beckoning to me, hard. As all my friends were inebriated, to put it nicely, and the wait list for a taxi was of indeterminate time, I was without a ride.
You would think that a cosmopolitan city would expect to have more taxi cab drivers available. It seemed the ratio of party-goers to taxi cabs were about 1000:1 last night. After an hour and half at Nick’s house party and some sobered up people, I got my ride.
As we drove through downtown at 4-ish in the morning, there were scores of people everywhere: on the curb, at street corners, on their mobiles, waiting for the next operator i’m sure to put their names on a waitlist for a cab, since all the cabs were in use and there were no free ones to flag down off the street.
Now THAT is the real Halloween horror. When all you want to do is get home and you can’t.
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