It's Guy Fawkes Night Day! Let's burn something!

Holy crap, tonight is Guy Fawkes Night and I almost forgot! What the hell is Guy Fawkes Night? Here, read this. No time? I'll sum up. Guy Fawkes was part of an anti-protestant plot to blow up the Parliament building in London along with most of the MP's, the King and a healthy chunk of the city. It was totally made into a historically accurate documentary with Natalie Portman. Go watch it.

Thanks to V for Vendetta, the Guy Fawkes mask has become a symbol of resistance against
corruption. Either that or these kids really want to see the restoration of a Catholic monarch...

James I of England, VI of Scotland.
Known as James the Un-blow-upable.

Anyway, Fawkes was sort of the idiot of the group and ended up getting caught underneath the House of Lords with the 17th century equivalent of an explosive-filled Ryder truck. He and the other conspirators were eventually executed by hanging, vivisection and dismemberment. Because English people are deranged. So now, in celebration of King James I's miraculous survival (and because hey, who doesn't like fire?), British people burn effigies of Fawkes every November 5th. Also they drink. I assume.

It's like a British Burning Man except with colder weather and
anti-Catholic origins instead of 'shrooms and nudity.