In university in Leeds...
The landlord of our student house had been round a few weeks earlier and savagely felled all the trees in our garden and left all the branches and twigs outside the house making the whole place look like the Blair Witch Woods.

So we decided as it was November 5th to invite a load of people over and have a bonfire party. So we cut up all the wood, piled it into a sizeable bonfire and attempted to light it in the traditional way - unwilling to give it some time, a bright spark in the group nips off to the garage and returns with a can of petrol - which he proceeds to pour onto the bonfire without noticing the lick of flame in the depths of the wood.

Cue, eight foot blast of fire! Petrol can catches fire. Unfortunately, the perpetrator's mind deactivates momentarily and he runs around holding the flaming can accompanied by the voices of thirty people shouting 'drop it you twat!'

He finally drops the can which spills out and leaves a lake of burning fuel on the lawn of the house, very close to the pavement and nearby road. As we discuss the relative merits of calling the fire brigade, I attempt to warn passing pedestrians - unfortunately they are not convinced by my 'i'd cross the road mate, there's a load of petrol on fire down there' warning - that is until they feel the searing heat of the three foot column of flaming petrol.

Long story short, whilst our invited guests (and my other housemates) cower around the corner I singlehandedly put out the fire using every single tea towel in the house and a bath mat. Hurrah!

We did manage to light the bonfire which attracted a guy from across the road who long after we'd all gone inside stood out in the pissing rain and stoked the bonfire whilst we peeked out from behind the curtains to watch him dancing around the fire in a tribal fashion. And it attracted another bloke who was off his tits on something and wandered uninvited into our house for a bit, well until we threw him out. Corner of Winston Mount & Headingley Mount, Headingley, Leeds, November 5th 2003 - were either of these people you?

Sorry, that's quite a long story really - not entirely sure it was worth it now?!
( Gnoll, Wed 3 Mar 2004, 15:22, Reply)