Michael Rann: Zombie Hunter aka. Memoirs of a Wishful Thinker

Entry #1

Wednesday June 7th 2006

Gurnard Hunting Elite Meeting

Location: Donny’s Bar & Grill

I turned up to the Bar & Grill at roughly 18:15, Donny & Chuck had already started on the Jim Beam. I ‘m starting to think our lack of call outs has started to make them stop believing that we can do this.
“On the booze already?” I asked.
“Yep” Chuck replied.
“We’ve been doing this same exact thing for the past six months now” Donny added “I just can’t see much opportunity on the Isle of Wight for bounty hunters!”
I was right. “C’mon guys, what would Boba Fett have to say if he heard you right now? And if Dog the Bounty Hunter can get that much work, then so can we!”
Before the guys got a chance to argue with my fictional character and crappy TV show response my earache was saved by the arrival of Harrison.

“’Sup guys!” That northern tone was like music to my ears, not to mention the casual two thumbs up as he side stepped into the shed. If anyone, Harrison would stick with me.

These twice a week meetings (Wednesdays and Saturdays) always wound up the exact same way. The meet-ups started at 18:00 (or at least in a half hour vicinity) at Donny’s Bar & Grill aka. Donny’s shed at the top of his semi-long garden. This was our headquarters. The inside of the shed was heated, with a makeshift bar with plenty of whiskey, rum and homemade beer, a rolled out poker matt working as a drip tray and the only real object in the place that made us the elite we so wished to be... The red telephone. For the first half hour of most meetings would be an enthusiastic brainstorm of nonsense ideas of how we could be the most famous squad of bounty hunters on the planet. After the ideas started to cool down is when we’d start hitting the bottle and getting pissed off, mainly with the fact that around a year ago Dog the Bounty Hunter hit the screens in the UK (although if truth be told that’s probably where we got the idea from).
This meeting wasn’t the first that was slightly different. The guys were all getting annoyed that the last time the red phone rang was about two months ago and even then it was just some asshole market researcher.

Tonight it was only about 20 minutes before we all started taking shots and dealing poker.
“Maybe we just need better ad posters?” I piped up, only to get shot down by three half drunken stares that lasted about four seconds before gazing back at their cards. “Maybe not”.
Somehow I still knew we’d all be meeting again on Saturday...