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The UM BlackLight Contest and Ball - Results


Taun

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Well, 2017's version of UM's "BlackLight Costume Contest Valentine's Day Dance and Rummage Sale" has passed and was another smashing success!... Attendance was at an all time high (no doubt helped along by the Chief Inquisitor's Office releasing all of the Inmates residents of the Lurkers Dungeons for this affair), and a fun time was had by all - as witnessed by the fact that the Riot squad was called out 5 times - beating last years record of 4 times - and the National Guard had to be called in at closing time to assist the Sheriff's Department in rounding up the usual suspects....

Here is how the evening went:

The party-goers formed up just across the Grand Bridge of Sorrows which spans the Great Outer Moat... With the UM Kazoo and Snare Drum Marching Band leading the way with a rousing rendition of "Louie Louie" The parade kicked off and crossed the bridge to the cheers of hordes of on lookers - and the hungry gaze of Pookie the Moat Monster...The survivors then wended their way down the Grand Concourse, between the Central Administration Complex and the massive Repository Of Lost Postings Complex to a veritable blizzard of confetti, ticker-tape and rotten tangerines, which rained down on us from the many Office Drudges Workers who make this great Establishment work! Normally the Drudges Office Workers would be in the parade - displaying their pride - but the Head Flogger in Charge of them could not find the keys to their shackles in time - so they enjoyed some (un-paid) overtime... The parade then crossed over the Great Outer Moat again - on the Eastern side of the Complex - and into the Great Eastern Artillery Impact Zones, and over to the UM Mortuary where a crew of Zombies, caffeine freaks and "the very nervous" had spent the past three months decorating the Grand Ballroom...

Marching order for the parade was: The UM Kazoo And Snare Drum Marching Band, The world famous UM Precision Drill Team of Zombie Nixon's and Churchill's, Some random tourists who were shanghaied into marching kind enough to join in the festivities, The ever popular "Inmates of The Dark Oubliette's Choir of Shriekers and Moaners" followed next and as always are a great crowd pleaser, Next came the Contestants for the BlackLight Costume Contest, marching under a portable BlackLight - a truly awesome sight as always ... Next came the people who just wanted to dance, escorted by their fictitious spouses, dates and/or Zombie Escorts - A fan favorite was UM Asylum Member freetoroam who showed up escorted by a gaggle of custom modified Zombies - many creatively put back together with festive duct tape, super glue and bailing wire - The UM Office of Zombie Wranglers is currently studying her handiwork to see if any of the "kit bashed" zombies could be mass produced... Several parade floats were intermixed with the marchers - prominent among them were; A giant rubber duckie, A paper mache replica of the founding of the UM Complex complete with the Neanderthal's Quest to Find the Land of Accordions and a Mount Rushmore style float featuring the likenesses of The Head Mods of UM (The Office of the Grand Inquisitor is currently investigating who leaked the photos of the mods - so if you know who did it ... Probably best to keep silent)... Near the end was a platoon of Chief Floggers who "encouraged" stragglers to keep moving... Bringing up the rear - as always was the most popular entry - the cleaning crew who sweep up all the trash and removed those who "drop out"...

After arriving at the Ball room, the party started with a quick judging of the BlackLight Costumes (being under the blacklights for so long had started making some of the costumes - and people wearing them - begin to melt, so time was of the essence)... The winners were announced and prizes awarded, however a quick challenge by some of the winners led to a postponement of the announcements pending a full investigation, bribes and the usual amount of moaning, complaining, DNA testing and threats - by the winners... So the prizes were once again herded into their holding cells, where they await the naming of the unfortunate souls lucky winners...

Once the carnage of the Costume Contest was cleared away, the Dance started. The featured band "The Noggin Knockers" proved why they are the premier band in UM... They started the first set with their popular first recording hit, "I Wanna Smash Your Hand", then they moved into the romantic ballad "Take My Heart (But Give it Back Later I Might Need it)"... They were in fine form and received great applause when they finally quit... They set decibel records three times in their performance, which led to several unplanned "breaks" as their Roadies had to replace several of the musical instruments who had suffered excessive trauma... Two other newly formed member bands provided filler music when the Noggin Knockers took their breaks - they were the all female band "Lizzie Borden's Step-Kids" and the Punk Rock/Skiffle band "Why Should I tell You?" (At least that's what they said when asked what their name was)... Both bands were loud and fun to dance to, and neither one attacked the audience more than twice...Special thanks goes to the UM Chapter of the World Disaster Relief Organization - who were on hand as always - for minimizing casualties and providing hearing protection for those members who could afford it...

At the stroke of Midnight the Judges announced the winners of the Fictitious Spouse and/or Significant Other(s) beauty pageant... Below is a photo taken of the "Queen" and "King" of the Ball, on the landing just at the entrance to the Ballroom... The strapless, very risque gown certainly raised some eyebrows - and the Queens gown was rather daring as well.... Congrats to the winners!

 

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The Rummage Sale (a new event this year) will be held over the next three days, until all of the items left behind by partiers as they fled the Sheriff's Posse - and the odd bit dropped by the Zombie Dates - are sold... So come on down to the UM Morgue and Ball room and find a great deal on abandoned trash priceless relics of this years event!

During the closing ceremonies, the Chief Mod announced that the UM Office of the Chief Inquisitor would be available to help make bail for members who were "a little short"....

The success of this years UM BlackLight Costume Contest, Valentine's Day Dance and Rummage Sale has led the Planning committee to look eagerly forward to next years festivities  - Members who would like to volunteer to be on the planning committee should report to the Committee's Headquarters located in the third sub-basement of the Giant Trash Compactor building near the Quicksand factory... Remember - if not enough people volunteer... You just might GET volunteered!...

The next event planned by our evil overlords kind and caring Mods is this years UM Tricycle Race and Demolition Derby, next month... So get your favorite tricycle ready and write those wills!... See ya!

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I must say i am pretty proud of my creativeness, tis a shame the hands and feet fell off my zombies (I blame the supplier)  and I have no idea where the head went. But a wonderful time was had all the same.

 

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Unfortunately my "date" completely melted under the black lights.   :(   This is a picture of the two of us at the end of the night.   polka-dot-boots-puddle.png

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11 minutes ago, tcgram said:

Unfortunately my "date" completely melted under the black lights.   :(   This is a picture of the two of us at the end of the night.   polka-dot-boots-puddle.png

Oh dear, not even  duct tape would sort that one out.

you should get a zombie for next time......maybe Taun get you one, or some bits of one. ..i have a little bit of tape left to lend you.

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1 minute ago, freetoroam said:

Oh dear, not even  duct tape would sort that one out.

you should get a zombie for next time......maybe Taun get you one, or some bits of one. ..i have a little bit of tape left to lend you.

I will certainly remember that for next year.   

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8 hours ago, Four Winds said:

Strange but interesting blog post.

You ain't seen "strange" yet... But here it is: ;)

(From a "Welcome to UM post from May of 2015)"...

Let me tell you a bit about the UM (Unexplained Moosteries) Complex...

It was founded in 49,347 BC by a group of Neanderthal's who were cast out of their tribe for inventing Polka music (hard thing to do without an accordion)... They traveled far and
wide, trying to find a place they could live, prosper and polka, but everywhere they went other Neanderthals made insulting remarks about their silly clothes, odd attraction to bright
shiny objects and of course, their polka music...

As fate would have it, however, their quest for "Polka Paradise" caused them to not be affected by the extinction of their non-polka-ing Neanderthal relatives... No one is certain what
led to the demise of all the non-polka-ing Neanderthals... It could have been a disease, it could have been caused by competition with "modern humans" for food and living space... Or
perhaps, it was because they didn't have the flexibility and mobility granted by almost non-stop polka parties... In any case, one day the Polka Questing Neanderthals looked up
and all the other Neanderthal's were dead...  Recent research by the UM department of Highly Improbable Archaeology has suggested that the Polka Questing Neanderthals were
spared because the Modern Humans they encountered actually liked to polka... While it has been proven that all the evidence was faked, the theory is still gaining widespread support...

One early afternoon, Chief Polka-meister Ugg awakened with an incredible hangover, and decided that since the right side of his large misshapen head was hurting slightly less than the
left side, they would turn from their normal questing route, and turn East...  This eventually led them into a large, very isolated valley that was teeming with exotic wildlife (some of it not
instantly lethal). And there... In the center of this huge valley, stood what modern archaeologists call a "yardang" - a large rock outcropping that resembles some object... This yardang
was in the shape of the much sought after - semi-mythical - accordion!... They had found Polka Paradise!

Wasting no time, the tribe of exhausted but overjoyed Neanderthals immediately got drunk and passed out... While sleeping it off, Ugg's third wife, Shirley, kept crowding closer to her husband
and still wanted more room on the bed of thorns and tree branches... she started telling her husband ..."Move over dummy!' - repeatedly... until her
throat hurt from talking so much... So she started
just using the initials.. and thus she became the first MOD...

Claiming the title of MOD, Shirley quickly began organizing the hungover tribe into building the first structures of what would - thousands of years later become the Galactically famous "UM
Complex"...

First she had them build a shoe store.. and then organized a "think tank" to invent shoes... While this was being done, Shirley's friend (and later most bitter arch rival) Gertrude, made the first
recorded encounter with Pookie the Moat Monster... it wasn't a true moat monster then - as moats had not been invented, nor was it as large as he is today.. No, at first it was Pookie the Puddle Pest...
Gertrude thought that the small (no larger than a T-Rex) Puddle Pest was cute, with it's thousands of snakey tentacles, multiple rows of weirdly glowing green spines and spikes down what she took for it's back,
and of course the long fangs and horns...  She named it Pookie, and as a best guess decided that it was actually (mostly) a he - though even to this day scientists are uncertain about Pookies actual gender (Or
genders)...

Feeding Pookie with whatever animals they could catch - that didn't catch them- and the odd tribal member that irritated them, Pookie quickly was "tamed" and became quite happy to let the weird little
pink and brown critters, feed him...

At the start of the last great Ice-age, What would become the "UM complex" was graced with it's first moat - for protection and also to house the steadily growing - apparently immortal - Pookie... The Moat
(Now part of the Central Complex's irrigation and sanitation system) was considered an engineering marvel of it's age and curious Homo-Sapiens (and the few remaining Non-Polka-ing Neanderthals)
came from dozens of miles away to "Oooh" and "Aaaah!" at it... So tourism was born... Since the people back then were incredibly clumsy, they would crowd around to get a better look at the
marvelous moat, and would invariably knock a few in - thus bathing was invented also...

The ice age also caused a discovery that would shake the very foundations of "Polka Paradise"... Ice... Now they could chill their beer... Nothing was ever the same for the (near) human race after this...

All the many years of living in this sheltered valley, led to much scientific research, which (since they were rather dense) led to many unexplained mysterious things and events... like sunshine, rain,
puberty, and the migrations of Moose.. So to find answers, the ruling council of MOD's - headed by Chief Head MOD Bertha (daughter of HandsomeStranger) established the "Academy of Unexplained
Mooseteries" (and since she had a weird accent - it sounded like "Unexplained Mysteries") - Thus, UM was founded in the year 11,945 BC (on a Thursday)... (This year is the 14,000 year anniversary!)

Many inventions and discoveries followed, like higher math (using our toes to count on as well), pizza and of course the discovery of those revoltingly cute, toxic, ravenous and highly dangerous Squiggles
that are now kept as pests pets in almost every cell block, oubliette, and dungeon...  But something was still missing...

Then many centuries later, a traveling standup comedian, from the Sumerian City of Ur happened by... Just before he met his unfortunate end, after meeting Pookie, he taught a few of the MODS his language...
That was what was missing... A coherent language that actually used words - rather than grunts, hoots and shrieks...  This is how Ancient Hittite became the standard UM language for all official business and
government, as it is today...

Over the centuries and millennia, the complex has grown from the original huts of twigs, sticks and empty beer cans to the gleaming, glittering skyscrapers of concrete, chrome, steel, glass and empty beer cans of
today...

We have many traditions, and more are being thought up each and every day.. So take pride in being a member! And wear your Newby Beanie cap (with propeller on top) with haughty, snobbery and disdain for
your lessers! Remember all the billions of people - both Polka dancing Neanderthal's and their Homo Sapiens slaves servants underlings minions friends who have gone before.. and are still with us! (we're gonna
hafta bury some of those some day - they are starting to smell)...

 

WELCOME TO UM!

(Now grab a shovel and get to work!)

 

 

I can get "stranger" if you like.... :D



 

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I think the biggest failing of that contest was the lack of freebies like balloons, pens and shoe horns...Oh well...Maybe next time :)

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Oh wait... You mean ... freebies for the contestants?... We thought it was was freebies for US....  Wow... what a concept! Sounds expensive....

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