Epic fail

Another epic day, which started first thing with a visit to the osteopath. It's been a while since I was last there, and in that time I've endured a fair amount of stress which has led to some serious back issues. The whole of my mid spine had gone into lock down and made a hell of a racket when subjected to some "cavitation" which I prefer to describe as a load of weirdly "popping and clicking."

The procedure had a very odd effect on me. As I walked away from the clinic I got a bit tearful and then, when I went into a local Starbucks, I started laughing hysterically. I asked the woman behind the counter if tea came in a pot and the look she gave me was so odd that it triggered uncontrollable giggles.

I worked in Borough for a few hours before heading to Camden Town to meet Nathan for lunch. I decided to go for a quick pee in the public loos opposite the station, which turned out to be a fairly bad decision. I was feeling quite jolly, so was singing merrily as I skipped down the steps into the loo. Unfortunately, I underestimated the number of steps and fell down the last two, which caused me to lose my balance and land in an ungainly heap about a metre shy of the urinals! Obviously I found the epic fail hysterically funny but the rather dodgy-looking men hanging about in the loo were not amused!

We had a final set of auditions for our mystery project this afternoon at Cecil Sharp House. They went well. I think we all feel very chuffed. I love being in that building. It has such an extraordinary atmosphere. The folk song library in there is my favourite spot to hang out. They have books and books of manuscripts, all edited and compiled by those amazing blokes on bicycles like Butterworth, Sharp and Grainger who toured the country in the early 20th century, transcribing regional folk songs which would otherwise have disappeared for ever. They're my great heroes and it's such a privilege to rifle through their work. Two of the key melodies from A Symphony For Yorkshire were discovered in this process.

From Camden, we headed West to Turnham Green to the hallowed corridors of the Arts Educational School, where a group of recent graduates from the drama school were kind enough to read through the latest draft of our script so that we could hear it in the mouths of actors. It was a hugely worthwhile experience, particularly when, at the end of everything, we were able to get their feedback and find out what they they liked and what they weren't perhaps so sure about. We've not nailed the ending yet. That's for certain. But everything else feels in pretty good shape.

We went to the pub for a debrief after the reading and discussed what we're all going to be doing next week which is a sort of workshop week for the project which we're all getting very excited about. There is, however, a frightening amount of stuff to do between now and then. The difference is, I no longer think it's impossible!