Crackin' Up!

Sometimes I can’t believe how life has the capacity to so ruthlessly and continually kick you in the balls!  As we took our car away from the garage (after paying £1,000 to have a fist full of “necessary” repairs, which weren’t necessary 2 months previously when the car was serviced) a warning light started flashing on the dash-board. A little bit of research revealed that it was something to do with the power steering, so we took it back to the garage and asked what was wrong. A day later (today) they called Nathan to say that some kind of cord had snapped in the steering system and that the fault was going to be “expensive to remedy.” Worse than this, they don’t seem to want to take responsibility for the problem, despite the fact that they’d done work on the steering mechanism as part of the MOT. Surely, we’re not a million miles off the mark by suggesting that the fault was caused by something that the garage did? After all, we’d never seen this warning light before...

Nathan has finally snapped and was inconsolable on the phone. I simply don’t know what to do. We don’t have any more financial reserves to pay the garage for this new problem and absolutely can’t afford to get involved in a second court case - not just because the experience almost killed us, but because I simply do not trust the legal system any more. It is very rare for Nathan to disintegrate, and a part of me dies every time this happens.

We will get through this period. We absolutely will, because we have to. One day I’ll find a carrot or potato growing through the cracks in our patio and scream, “as God is my witness, I shall never go hungry again...” Sometimes it helps to imagine myself as Scarlet O’Hara!

I had a meeting with a really lovely woman at the MU today. We’re looking into the contractual side of composing to see if we can create a set of guidelines that might better protect creative people in the future; danger -words to look out for, phrases that might need explaining within the contract itself, formalisation of deadlines and timescales, removal of woolly phrases. They’ve spoken to me about joining the writers’ committee, which I’d be honoured to do. I’m now convinced that something positive will come from this period. We just need to keep trudging forward... It’s the first day of autumn today. I love autumn. It fills me with optimism.

As I write this, a poor woman on Deal or No Deal is going through the ringer, slowly moving closer and closer to leaving the game with just ten pence in her pocket. Somehow, I know how she feels. I think there are people all over this country who know how she feels.

 September 21^st, 1661, and Pepys had a pleasurable morning with Elizabeth and his father walking around the garden of their country house in Brampton. They talked about the alterations they wanted. It seems that 17^th Century folk spent their lives altering houses! I guess there were countless innovations concerning lighting and chimneys and windows, of which the upwardly mobile needed to keep abreast. As if to prove my point, Pepys spent the afternoon at Hinchinbrook House – Lord Sandwich’s impressive country estate – to see for himself the alterations that were happening whilst the big cheese was in Spain, and the rest of his clan were staying at the Wardrobe in London. The house was still in a bit of a mess – and Pepys was worried that the cloistered area (which sounds terribly grand) was going to be too dark...

Nobody wants you around here and that's for sure

I went to bed with a fever last night. I was shaking and sweating, first hot and then cold. Oddly, I took this to be a positive sign. The good guys in my immune system had obviously realised there was a problem and had finally started attacking the bad guys. I slept like a log, and sure enough, woke in the morning feeling a tiny bit better. I’m still not well. I’m still coughing like a tubercular child. I probably won’t be as right as rain for some days yet, but I feel a very small corner has been turned.

Today I’ve been revisiting the music I wrote for The Busker Symphony, specifically the third movement, which I’ve been arranging for a choir. I think when the shit hits the fan, the only option you have is to work harder. This thought occurs every time I have a set-back in my life. Of course, a career in the arts is more to do with luck than anything else, but the one thing we, as creative people, can do to help ourselves is learn to do stuff better. I’ve never seen myself as a man with a great deal of natural talent. My musical skills were never prodigious, and I’ve always considered myself to be more of a grafter. “Must work harder” has therefore been my mantra for many years now.

This evening we went to see a Fringe production of Honk! The Ugly Duckling, at the Hidden Theatre. A friend of Nathan’s has sunk his life savings into the piece, and we went to give him moral support. I’m therefore hugely relieved to report that the show is both charming, and beautifully staged. It’s well worth a visit, if you want to smile for a couple of hours on a rainy September night. The little boy on the end of our row was watching with a look of wonder plastered across his face. Kids like him make the very concept of live theatre worthwhile.

I was horrified, however, to hear quite how much money the show seems to be losing Nathan’s friend. It’s just not fair. It’s not getting large enough audiences, which is really upsetting because it should. Perhaps it’s because the theatre is tucked away in the back end of beyond. I can’t imagine why anyone would chose to journey to the fringes of Wandsworth to check out a musical. Surely you go to Wandsworth to riot and steal trainers.

Nathan’s friend’s experience instantly took me back to 1997, when I haemorrhaged my Grandmother’s will on a production of an opera I’d written called Someone Whistled. The £10,000 I spent – and lost – on the show, was probably money that should have gone towards a deposit for a house. The experience of staging a show, that on some evenings, NO ONE saw, was an incredibly demoralising experience. The piece actually did even worse than our worse-case scenario predictions! I think the pasting we got in Time Out even put off some of our friends who otherwise might have come. I was relatively new to London, which meant I was still suffering from that invisible sensation that the Big Smoke offers to all of its recent inmates.

I remember Fiona and Philippa sitting me down in the bar of the theatre and letting me have it gently, but firmly; “if we pull this show a week early, we won’t have to pay the musicians, or the theatre, and we could save ourselves a thousand pounds which we simply can’t afford to lose.” It was that dreadful sinking feeling. It was like losing all of my Christmas presents in a terrible fire caused by a faulty fairy light that I’d bought on the cheap. Of course I’d convinced myself that the world and his wife were biding their time and would turn up en masse to see the show during the last week, and was hoping against hope that all our problems would be miraculously cured by a glorious review. But deep down I knew that no such review was on the cards, and that the girls were right. So, with a quivering bottom lip, I pulled the show, and limped back home to lick my wounds.

Friday 20^th September 1661, and Pepys, very strangely, spent the day in a provincial East Midlands court surrounded by “country rogues” who “betrayed him.” Pepys lost the case – no doubt because he was seen as a hot-shot city type by these simple country folk; who included a smattering of faux intellectual types, no doubt the "bottom of the barrel" graduates from Cambridge University whose life could only be legitimised by lording it over a few villagers. The case itself was to do with a row over one of the finer points of Pepys’ Uncle’s Will – and Pepys lost property as a result. Life and art and all that... Or in this case life and life.

"Get out.. get out... get out of town!"

Couldn't sleep so I thought I'd take a walk

Instead of getting better, my cold took a turn for the worse last night, and I ended up being completely unable to sleep. The desire to cough became more and more intense, and yet, every time I coughed, I felt a sharp pain behind my right eye, which lasted for five minutes – almost as though I’d pulled some kind of muscle in my brain. Just as the pain eased, I'd find myself desperate to cough again, and so the cycle continued with me freaking out that I was having some kind of haemorrhage. I went into the sitting room and watched telly for long periods of time, before getting into bed, having another coughing fit, and finding mysef drifting back to the telly again. I saw an early morning episode of Countdown, and was struck, in my half-slumber, by just how annoying that 30-second piece of music is, with its weird, untuned timpani drum roll which doesn't change key with the rest of the music. It also struck me quite how often they play it during the programme and I wondered if they'd get away with that much repetition in a show commissioned in the 21st Century.

At another stage in the evening I was watching the Signing Zone. A strange man was floating around in the right hand corner of the screen, interpreting Holby City for deaf viewers. It was a curiously disorientating experience. The man remains the same size regardless of what's going on in the TV programme. Sometimes, it's like he's standing in the room with the actors. On other occasions he begins to resemble a poisoned dwarf. In any case, the experience became almost balletic, and a great deal more interesting than anything the actors were coming up with. I wonder if he directly translates all the medical jargon, or just signs "blah blah, meaningless medical stuff that I can't even spell... If you could hear this, you'd most likely try to block it out..." It must be the mother of all poisoned chalices!

I took myself to the emergency doctor this morning; a charming young woman, who thinks that Nathan and I have both had a virus. Unfortunately there’s little anyone can do about a virus, other than sit it out. She prescribed me some penicillin “just so you have it”, which felt like a rather peculiar gesture. On Nathan’s advice, I’ve started taking it. Afterall, what harm can it do?

Because of the cold, and the utterly surreal sensation of existing on 2 hours’ sleep, today’s been something of a wash out. I’ve been working on an arrangement of Mr Blue Sky for a choir I’ve decided to form, and was going through it with a fine-tooth comb today to make sure that none of the individual parts had any awkward passages.

I long to feel better, however. How can an exciting new period begin whilst I’m feeling lousy?

Those two Siamese twins that have been successfully separated today? Is it true that one of them is called Retard? Surely not?

Thursday 19^th September, 1661, and Pepys, Elizabeth and various family members went by horseback into Cambridge. They rode to Sturbridge to see the famous fair, which I’m reliably informed was the largest fair in Europe at its height – and the inspiration for Bunyan’s Vanity Fair. Sadly, the fair was almost over, so there was nothing much to see.

The day ended in the family home in Brampton, which was filled with Pepys’ immediate family members. His parents were both there, as were his brother, John, and sister-cum-servant, Pall.

And they had nothing to say

I'm still nursing a blinkin' cold. I think it might be time to go to the doctors. That said, Nathan is still spluttering, and he's on anti-biotics! Every time I cough, I get a shooting pain in my head, which can't be good for me. 

We're trying to watch The X-Factor on ITV player, and it's proving to be one of the most frustrating experiences in the world. The computer keeps stopping to buffer, before encountering a glitch mid-way through the bit when Tulisa bursts into tears because one of the contestants reminds her of her mother. The glitch sends the whole thing back to the start of the programme. When we try to spool through to where we were before the glitch, we're forced to watch adverts. I've seen eight in a row, now. We watch the adverts, get to the bit when Tulisa bursts into tears, and then, like a perfect ground-hog day, we return to the start of the show. I think ITV might want to try and sort out their system because this is no way to relax! We've now given up, and are watching Outnumbered instead. 

Other than this, there's little else to report. We've spent the day cleaning. In fact, there's not a single corner in the house which hasn't been washed, polished, sprayed or hoovered. My hands are red raw. This must be how those poor Victorian chamber maids felt after doing the weekly wash!

350 years ago, Pepys and Elizabeth's journey to Huntingdonshire continued. The roads were incredibly muddy, and poor Elizabeth took a second nose-dive from her horse, somewhere near Puckerage. By the time they'd arrived in Cambridge in the early afternoon, she was exhausted, and had started to irritate the hell out of her husband. 

They spent the rest of the day in Cambridge, before continuing their journey to the village of Impington where they spent the night with Pepys' elderly Uncle Talbot. 

Coming through a cloud you're looking at me from above

I'm on the 17th floor of a very swanky apartment block in Canary Wharf. It's like a terraced house in the clouds, and the views across London are extraordinary. The flat belongs to my friends Alex and Wiezek, and they're having a moving- in party. I am jealous. It's a very fancy flat, although not a single one of their neighbours is British, which I find somehow worrying, because it implies the natives in this country aren't rich enough to afford swanky pads! Or perhaps they simply think the flats don't represent value for money. Unfortunately, the lift is proving almost impossible to operate, which makes me realise that there are inherent problems involved in living in the sky!

Here's a question... How do you spell jush? Zhush?You know the phrase, "to jzush something up." It's a word used almost exclusively by rancid homosexuals and interior designers, but it's a word that I've never seen written down. Answers on a postcard please, because it's been bugging me for most of my life!!

350 years ago, Pepys informed his wife that he was planning to go to Huntingdonshire to sort out his Uncle's will once and for all. Elizabeth said that she wanted to join him on the journey, so a second horse was hired, along with a very pretty side saddle. Is riding side saddle not a great deal less comfortable? Surely it requires an astonishing level of balance? 

In any case, the married couple packed their things, said their goodbyes to the capital, and set off into the sticks. Elizabeth apparently rode well, although we're told she had a fall, which was not serious. They over-nighted in Ware. Where?!

And on all weekends when I meet my friends...

I'm waiting for a bus in Islington. Typical Upper Street. The bus stop comes complete with a rather fetching, bright red bench! It's the only place in London where you can sit in complete comfort whilst waiting for your bus.

I've been coughing and spluttering all day and am beginning to truly sympathise with Nathan, who went through this hell for five solid weeks.

I had lunch with my friend, Penny today. She treated me to a meal at Les Trois Garcons, which is one of the poshest restaurants in East London. I'm not usually a fan of fancy food, but the mushroom gnocchi was something else. It was fabulous to be there with her. Our table was in a great big pool of sunlight, and crystals in the window were filling the space with tiny dancing rainbows. We put the world to rights and planned all sorts of exciting schemes for the future. I adore Penny.

I'm a great deal happier today. Sure, yesterday we discovered that our MOT bill was actually over £1000, which is simply money we don't have, but, we have each other and I have fabulous supporters and brilliant friends. It's early days, but it may even end up being that the Choir Invisible did me a massive favour by royally shafting me in court! There's a huge amount of sympathy coming at me from people who think the verdict was "disappointing to say the least," and the Musicians' Union have even offered to pay my court costs. It's a mere drop in the ocean in terms of the ridiculous amount I still need to find, but it's a massive morale boost. Right from the start of this sorry business, the MU have been extraordinary. I would urge any musician reading this blog to sign up immediately, not just because I believe everyone should be the member of a union, but because they're one of the strongest unions out there. You even get to vote on Labour leadership elections!

In terms of finding the rest of the money, I think plans are afoot to have some kind of concert where the work, which caused the choir so many problems, would get its long-awaited premier. We may need to change the lyrics, which, of course, were written so specifically for the choir that they wouldn't work for any other group. It would, however, be lovely to think that the piece could have a future. I think it would be very popular with good amateur choirs.

Anyway, I digress. It's brother Edward's birthday today, so I went from Hoxton, via the new East London line, to his house in Canary Wharf, where my parents were hanging out. We watched our favourite show, Pointless, but the most interesting-looking couple went out in the first round. (I say it's my favourite show, but nothing in the world competes with The Great British Bake Off.) We went from Canary Wharf to Islington for dinner in a Turkish restaurant and it was here that my cold started to bother me again.

Still, I can't complain. My friend Matt is currently in hospital on morphine because he's had some kind of dreadful bug. The morphine's making him feel like the Pilsbury Dough Man, and he had an email from his agent earlier in the week suggesting he refrain from tweeting whilst under its influence! Too much information, one assumes, for his fans!

350 years ago, and Pepys took delivery of a winter's worth of coals, which for the record was 10 chaldron - which I assume is one of those random old-school measurements that my brother despises so intensely. For ages, I was reading the word as children, which I think would have been a great deal more entertaining. I love the idea of Pepys taking delivery of ten children.

Half way through the day, he was ordered by his father to go back to Huntingdon. That blinking will was still causing problems...

It's a rich man's world!

I woke up in a hot sweat this morning, having had one of the most transparent dreams of my life. I was in a supermarket with Nathan and we wanted to buy ourselves a little treat – a bar of chocolate as I recall. As Nathan took the money out of his wallet, a gust of wind took it from his hand, across the supermarket and out into the street. We ran after it, but it had disappeared. All our money is literally flying away!

This morning I solved an interesting conundrum. We have a man who walks around Highgate looking into dustbins. He’s not homeless; at least he doesn’t look homeless. I’ve always thought he was just a bit thrifty; or quite a lot thrifty. My Grandmother’s generation kept everything. On Christmas morning there’d always be the scream of “save the wrapping paper” and her drawers were filled to the brim with things that she’d kept; bits of string, buttons, brown paper, bottle tops. Christmas cards were always recycled as gift tags, cut into bizarre shapes with a pair of pinking shears, but I digress. This particular gentleman is maybe in his early 60s. He walks around with his trousers tucked into his socks, like he’s been on some kind of hiking tour. He carries a little bag with him, and periodically reaches into a dustbin and carefully takes something from it, which carry away.

This morning, however, I found him at the end of our alleyway poking and prodding the bin liners which were waiting for the bin men. We had previously assumed the little holes we often see in our bin bags were down to foxes. On one occasion, a load of sawdust and rat poo had escaped and found its way all over the pavement. We were, of course, mortified, but I think it’s now fair to assume that this gentleman was responsible. Poor bloke must have got the shock of his life when he dug a little hole and sawdust started flowing.

It is a strange thought, however. I suppose I’ve always tended to assume that anything I throw away will be somehow anonymous. Yesterday I was binning all sorts of items of clothing and bits of paper that I’m not sure I’d want someone to be rifling through. Most of me says “good on you” to the ueber thrifty man – but the hypocrite in me says; “could you, perhaps, leave my rubbish alone.”

On my way to the cafe this morning, I came upon a South African man who was having a door fitted at the southern end of the alleyway that goes behind our house. I was a bit miffed, really, as it means we’re no longer able to access our house from that end. He tells me that the alleyway belongs to everyone whose house backs onto it, but that we only own the bit of the alleyway that corresponds to our property. It’s therefore his right, or my right, to follow the logic through, to fit a door that prevents drunks from going down there to pee. I have sympathy for him, but if we decided to erect a doorway at OUR end of the alleyway, then no one would be able to access their houses! I thought the least he could do was offer us a key, but he didn't, and I didn’t make a fuss, partially, because the journey down the alleyway in that direction involves negotiating a series of dangerous pavements which become swampy in the winter, but also because I’ve recently decided I need to pick my arguments more carefully. From henceforth, I shall never complain about something, unless I'm simultaneously complimenting someone on something else. The yin and the yang.

350 years ago, Pepys attended the funeral of his Aunt Kite, writing, “besides us and my uncle Fenner’s family, there was none of any quality, but poor rascally people.” It feels very bizarre to judge the worth of someone purely based on the people who attend their funeral! I'd much rather he blamed everything on the fact that his aunt's actual name was Julian!