Yeah, you read that right, it’s International Day Of Slayer! I’ve just counted and I make 57 mentions of Slayer in Cleo Howard’s Diaries and 44 in the Eviscerated Panda Saga. They’ve been in my ears for years and as a teenager I sulked around garden centres with my family while wearing a Slayer T-shirt, wanting to be left to listen to Slayer on my Walkman (for younger readers a Walkman is an olden days MP3 player that you put cassette tapes in). “Cheer up faceache, I’ll buy you some fudge” my nan would say and I’d muster a small number of words affirming that I suppose I could probably eat some fudge. I bet Tom Araya isn’t eating fudge I’d be thinking. I bet he’s doing something cool and no one has asked his opinion on which is the healthiest looking clematis.

Anyway, here are the January 1997 entries from Cleo Howard’s Diary that mention Slayer:

Saturday 4^th January 1997

Tonight at the Green Man (Reading’s best pub, Dear Diary) there was me, Ian, Jenni, Bob and Simon The Raspberry. I love going to the pub. We sat in a corner by a fireplace. There was great stuff played on the jukebox: Megadeth’s “In My Darkest Hour”, Ozzy Osbourne’s “Bark at the Moon”, Slayer’s “Angel of Death” and Entombed’s “Demon”.

Sunday 12^th January 1997

I lay in bed all morning reading The Hitch-Hikers Guide To The Galaxy and listening to Slayer’s Reign in Blood album. Then I got up for dinner (cheese crispy pancakes, peas and mash, followed by yummy Viennetta). Then I lay in bed all afternoon until Mum made me go up the shop for her to get loo roll because we’ve run out. She made me brush my hair as well as getting dressed! For Lemmy’s sake, it’s a Sunday, and no-one cares if you buy loo roll with untidy hair. Also, she works in a supermarket, so why do we keep running out of basic stuff?

 Monday 20^th January 1997

It was so hard to get out of bed today. I wanted to stay in my cosy sleep fog. If it wasn’t for Mum shouting up the stairs and for Slayer’s “South of Heaven” I’d never have got upright.

Some twats at school today were going on about how great ecstasy is and how Brian Harvey shouldn’t have got kicked out of East 17 for taking it. Frankly I don’t care how East 17 end, just so long as they do.

Meanwhile, I’ve got bigger stuff to think about, should I dye my hair blonde? The Great Kat looks amazing. Ian said she gives him a stiffy of epic proportions. He thinks she would give the best hand jobs in the world because of her guitar virtuosity. I said maybe she’ll tug him off and record his grunting noises and squeals of pleasure as a track on her next album.

Lex and Mopey Dick spoke to me and Jenni today. They are in the sixth form and are Goths. Jenni fancies Lex even more than she fancies Dazza. Mopey needed to borrow some eyeliner. He said he felt naked without it. He talks really slowly, like just being alive is an effort. He sounds a bit like a record played at the wrong speed. His proper name is Richard Rippingdale and he tried to get everyone to call him “Ripper”, which is a very good Goth name, but instead every calls him Mopey Dick, which suits him well.

We did long division in Maths today. I did really, really long division because it seems to take me longer than everyone else.