Oh yes I did!

You know when you get home from a long trip, sit down in front of the telly and fall asleep without blogging? That!

Apologies to any regular readers who tuned in this morning to be met by radio silence...

Yesterday was a rather bitty day. I was still in Wakefield, but opted to do a day's work on Brass, which was (pleasantly) interrupted by the schedule of Nathan's pantomime. A gruelling three shows in one day!

Quite a lot of people had come up to see him, including Jem and Ian and a lady called Michelle, who is one of Nathan's test knitters but this was the first time they'd actually met. It was like an episode of Surprise Surprise when they bring the 40-year-long pen pals together. Nathan was so excited to meet her. She'd brought her family to the panto, all of whom were incredibly lovely.

Jem and Ian thoroughly enjoyed themselves. In fact, the role of Ghastly Gordon initially went to Ian, who had to pull out to do another show. I can't remember whether I've jotted down the weird set of coincidences which led to Nathan getting the part, but it started in a Pizza Express in the very far North of London, with Ian mentioning they were re-auditioning for his former role in two days time and me saying "perhaps Nathan ought to see if he could get himself seen..." And the rest is history.

We went out for dinner after the show with some of the cast and I had to keep buttoning up my desire to make Ian stand up at the table so I could shout "here's what you could have won!"

I think it's been the perfect win-win situation, however. Ian gets to be in a West End show and Wakefield gets an astonishing pantomime villain.

Ian and Jem took me home to London and we talked about how wonderful Nathan is in the role. It's the funniest I've ever seen him on stage. His side kick, the lovely Sue Chef (they're both cooks, you see, I suppose Nathan is meant to be a warped Gordon Ramsey) plays off him perfectly. They're a formidable, scene-steeling double act. I couldn't be more proud.