Today was another scramble, essentially to achieve very little. I seem to be spending all my time at the moment jumping on tubes and heading to meetings and appointments which are nowhere near Highgate. There's a huge amount to achieve before rehearsals for Brass begin on Friday, but, for some reason, I'm spending all my time editing the Pepys Motet film, which, of course, has to be done, but does it need to take this long to do it? As of this evening, however, I'm relieved to report that my work on the project is almost done. I've even given the film a little grade, upping the contrast in some of the shots, and making others a little lighter. The only problem is that I'm waiting for Carmen in the US to film and send me her little segment, which she's going to do with her fiancé. As soon as I have that, I can get the film online, tell everyone about it, and forget all about it. Until then, I'll feel the project hanging over me like a rotten vine. I find it quite difficult to move onto pastures new whilst the fields behind me haven't yet been harvested!
I went for osteopathy this afternoon, and stayed in town to meet Nathan and Carey for lunch. We sat in the churchyard behind Central St Giles, an incredibly peaceful spot which very few people appear to use. The others ate food from a rather fancy place called Pod, where I could find nothing which didn't either come with lashings of coriander or have the calorific content of air. I just can't be doing with the whole wheat-free, carb-free, sodium-free, fat-free, taste-free vibe.
This evening we came to Above The Stag in Vauxhall, which is London's only LGBT theatre. I'd never been there before. I'm slightly embarrassed to admit that I didn't even know it existed. I'm told it used to operate above the pub next to the Victoria Palace Theatre until the whole area was knocked down, I think, for Cross Rail. Vauxhall is, of course, after the death of Soho, London's only gay district, so it made sense to relocate the theatre there.
I like Vauxhall. I don't know it at all well, but it's got a really nice, quite American vibe. It's a district where old and new rub shoulders rather convincingly. There are countless, somewhat dingy, Victorian railway arches, but look up and you'll see a plethora of shiny chrome skyscrapers. Much of the gay scene is situated within the darkened, twisting warrens of former railway-owned property. There are gay bars, saunas, shops, cafes as well as the theatre, and on a summer evening, like tonight, it buzzes like a district of Miami, with fabulous bears spilling out onto the streets!
We were at the theatre to see the handiwork of photographer, Gaz Sherwood, who'd taken pictures of us singing as part of his "Sing Out" project, which focusses on LGBT people working in the musical theatre industry. His latest set of portraits are being displayed on the walls of the theatre bar, and tonight was a sort of launch event. I'll be honest and say I felt rather proud to have my portrait hanging on the wall of a theatre. I'm sure it's a pretty common experience for an actor, but it's very exciting new ground for me, which instantly took me back to myself as an eight-year old, staring longingly at the glamorous head shots of actors working in Northampton's Royal Theatre.
Gaz is a wonderful photographer. His work is incredibly detailed and the pictures are crystal clear. He presented us with a pair of prints of the images he'd chosen which were printed on water colour paper, which looked fabulous. I wish I could have used mine for my driving license!
Wednesday, 10 August 2016
How the other half live
Today I learned what a profoundly useless organisation the British Post Office has become. After yesterday's ludicrous queuing incident, I went back to the Highgate branch and, as I handed my package over to be stamped, I realised the tape around the edge of the package had started to come unstuck. I noticed a stapler on the server's desk and asked if I could borrow it quickly to staple the corners together to prevent the CD I was sending from falling out. "I'm afraid I can't let you use that," said the woman. "Really? Why?" I asked. "For health and safety reasons..."
This afternoon I had the misfortune of visiting the "Post Shop" in Greenwich, where all the members of staff looked like they'd been slapped about by large wedges of camembert. All I needed was a passport photo for my driver's licence. They had a photo booth. The only trouble was that it cost £5 and only accepted coins. I went up to one of the counters, clutching a £5 note, waiting for the woman behind the counter to draw breath whilst talking to a friend, and asked if she could give me change. "No, sorry" she said, politely enough, "I don't have that much change in my till." I wasn't sure I believed her. She sent me to the counter opposite where there was a massive queue. After five minutes, I was served. I asked for change and the woman sighed the sigh of a martyr, took my fiver, and handed me five £1 coins, her lips sagging with the weight of her generosity.
I had my photo taken in the booth. It took a while to get the hang of the weird spinning seat thing. A slip of a button later, and I'd ordered one large copy of my chosen image rather than 4 small ones, so that was instantly £5 down the drain.
I spoke to the woman at the till again, and explained that I'd pressed the wrong button and that I didn't have any more cash. Could I perhaps pay with a card? She ushered me to the back of the post office and told me I could get cash there. She didn't tell me she meant over the counter. That took a while to work out. Then there was another five-minute wait in the queue...
The man behind the counter duly gave me £5 in £1 coins and I went back to the passport machine, posed for yet another picture (feeling increasingly self-conscious) and pressed the button for four smaller shots. In the meantime my "large portrait" picture came out of the machine, all fuzzy-edged with a great big purple blob on my forehead which made it look like I'd badly dyed my hair. The four shot then came out. It had cut the top of my head off and the purple blob this time was across my forehead. Plainly there was something wrong with the printing process!
I went to the counter and asked if I could possibly have a refund. "You made a mistake and pressed the wrong button," she said. "That's very true" I said, "but the purple splodge on the photograph would make this photo unusable even if I'd wanted a photo this size." I handed her the other photo: "And there's purple all over this set as well. I've spent £10 now and I still have nothing for my driving license!" She looked at the four smaller photos, "well you can't use these ones for a driving license because you've cut the top of your head off..." "But these pictures are purple, and I would hazard that they'd still be purple even if I spent another £5 making sure the top of my head wasn't cut off! Your machine is faulty!"
So I was sent over to the manager, which involved standing in yet another queue. She looked at the pictures and pointed at the full-sized shot, "I'm prepared to refund you on that one, but not the other one. You've cut your head off on the other. I can't be held responsible for that." Feeling like a broken record, I mentioned the fact that I felt pretty confident that, if I did take another photograph, and sat properly in the chair, I'd still end up with a purple splodge on my forehead. I asked if this would cause an issue with the passport office. "Go back to the booth and take another photo making sure your eyes are level with the markers on the screen. That's the only advice I can give you... Or speak to the lady over there who can take you into the back room where they have a studio that does all that stuff properly." The lady she pointed at was the first woman I'd spoken to. The one who didn't have change! The one who, it turns out, could have saved me money and time by telling me that she had an on-site business which specialised in the very thing I was looking for. But no. She was too busy talking to her mate to want my custom.
The manager took the photos from me, handed me a refund and I went back to the photo booth only to realise she'd given me a refund which included a £2 coin, which I couldn't use in the machine. As I emerged, red-faced and angry looking, a lovely American lady came up to me: "if you're looking for passport pictures, there's a wonderful chemist around the corner where they do a great service." So I left the Post Shop and went there instead. She was right. The lady in the chemist who took my picture complimented me on my odd socks, put me at my ease, took the picture without any fuss, delivering four individually cut photos five minutes later.
It's been a genuinely frustrating afternoon. I was filming Rebel Chorus member, Mel for our Pepys video in the Greenwich foot tunnel. The last time I went down there during the day it was entirely empty, but today, probably because it's the school holidays, the place was humming: absolutely rammed with people, all of whom seemed desperate to rush into the background of the shot and do that stupid rabbit ear thing with their fingers that Japanese teenaged girls do. Why do people do that? Do they think it will improve the image? Do they think I won't notice and they'll end up a YouTube sensation? Do they think they're the first people in the world to play that oh-so-funny practical joke? One group of kids heard the music we were playing as a guide for lip-syncing and decided to join in. Singing became shouting. Shouting became yelling, and before we knew it, the entire foot tunnel had become a high-pitched, echoing scream-fest which lasted three minutes and became so loud and grating we were both forced to block our ears. It was so, so horrifying.
I went into Soho later on to discover that the lovely little cafe on the corner of Wardour Street and Old Compton Street, in which I've spent many a happy end of ending, has closed down. Another casualty, one assumes, of rising rents and impending Brexit-related recession.
I was somewhat cheered by the sight of a man walking a ferret down Lower St Martin's Lane, and a lovely early-evening drink with our friend Carey from New York, who kept us thoroughly entertained with stories from Broadway.
This afternoon I had the misfortune of visiting the "Post Shop" in Greenwich, where all the members of staff looked like they'd been slapped about by large wedges of camembert. All I needed was a passport photo for my driver's licence. They had a photo booth. The only trouble was that it cost £5 and only accepted coins. I went up to one of the counters, clutching a £5 note, waiting for the woman behind the counter to draw breath whilst talking to a friend, and asked if she could give me change. "No, sorry" she said, politely enough, "I don't have that much change in my till." I wasn't sure I believed her. She sent me to the counter opposite where there was a massive queue. After five minutes, I was served. I asked for change and the woman sighed the sigh of a martyr, took my fiver, and handed me five £1 coins, her lips sagging with the weight of her generosity.
I had my photo taken in the booth. It took a while to get the hang of the weird spinning seat thing. A slip of a button later, and I'd ordered one large copy of my chosen image rather than 4 small ones, so that was instantly £5 down the drain.
I spoke to the woman at the till again, and explained that I'd pressed the wrong button and that I didn't have any more cash. Could I perhaps pay with a card? She ushered me to the back of the post office and told me I could get cash there. She didn't tell me she meant over the counter. That took a while to work out. Then there was another five-minute wait in the queue...
The man behind the counter duly gave me £5 in £1 coins and I went back to the passport machine, posed for yet another picture (feeling increasingly self-conscious) and pressed the button for four smaller shots. In the meantime my "large portrait" picture came out of the machine, all fuzzy-edged with a great big purple blob on my forehead which made it look like I'd badly dyed my hair. The four shot then came out. It had cut the top of my head off and the purple blob this time was across my forehead. Plainly there was something wrong with the printing process!
I went to the counter and asked if I could possibly have a refund. "You made a mistake and pressed the wrong button," she said. "That's very true" I said, "but the purple splodge on the photograph would make this photo unusable even if I'd wanted a photo this size." I handed her the other photo: "And there's purple all over this set as well. I've spent £10 now and I still have nothing for my driving license!" She looked at the four smaller photos, "well you can't use these ones for a driving license because you've cut the top of your head off..." "But these pictures are purple, and I would hazard that they'd still be purple even if I spent another £5 making sure the top of my head wasn't cut off! Your machine is faulty!"
So I was sent over to the manager, which involved standing in yet another queue. She looked at the pictures and pointed at the full-sized shot, "I'm prepared to refund you on that one, but not the other one. You've cut your head off on the other. I can't be held responsible for that." Feeling like a broken record, I mentioned the fact that I felt pretty confident that, if I did take another photograph, and sat properly in the chair, I'd still end up with a purple splodge on my forehead. I asked if this would cause an issue with the passport office. "Go back to the booth and take another photo making sure your eyes are level with the markers on the screen. That's the only advice I can give you... Or speak to the lady over there who can take you into the back room where they have a studio that does all that stuff properly." The lady she pointed at was the first woman I'd spoken to. The one who didn't have change! The one who, it turns out, could have saved me money and time by telling me that she had an on-site business which specialised in the very thing I was looking for. But no. She was too busy talking to her mate to want my custom.
The manager took the photos from me, handed me a refund and I went back to the photo booth only to realise she'd given me a refund which included a £2 coin, which I couldn't use in the machine. As I emerged, red-faced and angry looking, a lovely American lady came up to me: "if you're looking for passport pictures, there's a wonderful chemist around the corner where they do a great service." So I left the Post Shop and went there instead. She was right. The lady in the chemist who took my picture complimented me on my odd socks, put me at my ease, took the picture without any fuss, delivering four individually cut photos five minutes later.
It's been a genuinely frustrating afternoon. I was filming Rebel Chorus member, Mel for our Pepys video in the Greenwich foot tunnel. The last time I went down there during the day it was entirely empty, but today, probably because it's the school holidays, the place was humming: absolutely rammed with people, all of whom seemed desperate to rush into the background of the shot and do that stupid rabbit ear thing with their fingers that Japanese teenaged girls do. Why do people do that? Do they think it will improve the image? Do they think I won't notice and they'll end up a YouTube sensation? Do they think they're the first people in the world to play that oh-so-funny practical joke? One group of kids heard the music we were playing as a guide for lip-syncing and decided to join in. Singing became shouting. Shouting became yelling, and before we knew it, the entire foot tunnel had become a high-pitched, echoing scream-fest which lasted three minutes and became so loud and grating we were both forced to block our ears. It was so, so horrifying.
I went into Soho later on to discover that the lovely little cafe on the corner of Wardour Street and Old Compton Street, in which I've spent many a happy end of ending, has closed down. Another casualty, one assumes, of rising rents and impending Brexit-related recession.
I was somewhat cheered by the sight of a man walking a ferret down Lower St Martin's Lane, and a lovely early-evening drink with our friend Carey from New York, who kept us thoroughly entertained with stories from Broadway.
Tuesday, 9 August 2016
Happy unbirthday
My birthday started rather badly. Nathan went to work. I had my evening plans cancelled and I ended up home alone. It was all a little desperate. I sat in front of the telly editing my film whilst wishing I'd thought a little harder about what I might do today.
Nathan, bless him, must have texted some of my friends, because I had a series of lovely messages, many of which took the form of little films and photographs. My favourite came from Goddaughter Deia, who was on a trampoline. Her head kept bouncing into shot whilst she sang a deeply scatalogical version of Happy Birthday. There was also a photo from my cousins Matt and Boo, which their three children in Stockholm holding a sign which read "Happy Birthday Ben." Lovely. People are so kind. And inventive.
I spoke to my Mum at lunchtime who suggested I took a trip up to Thaxted, and it struck me that this was the right thing to do. If in doubt, head to the parents! I tried to post some letters before leaving. The queue for the Highgate Post Office stretched out into the street, just like it gets in the run up to Christmas. I hung around, ineffectually hoping it would miraculously disappear if I muttered swear words under my breath. Peering into the shop I noticed that the man at the front of the queue was sending scores of parcels, so I gave up, and decided to go to Muswell Hill en route. I'm not sure what it was about Monday August 8th, but that branch was similarly chocka. I'd paid for 25 minutes' parking, and, after twenty, was no nearer the counters, so gave up and drove to Thaxted in a foul mood.
Thaxted provided me with exactly the tonic I was looking for, not least because my parents' old friend, Mo was there. Mo was a colleague of my father's at the school he taught at and I went to, so she's known me since I was perhaps 8 years old. She lived in Crouch End whilst I was at Mountview and used to take me out for cups of tea and chocolate croissants to make sure I was okay. She sat on the front row at our wedding and is in a lot of the shots. She looks a little like my Mum, so I assume the TV people thought she was my aunt. Frankly, she might as well be. She's an absolute riot and has always reminded me of Joanna Lumley. In the last year she's lost a phenomenal amount of weight after being diagnosed with type two diabetes, which she's actually managed to reverse. There is a revolutionary new treatment plan which the university of Newcastle has created involving fast weight loss which genuinely seems to work. If the body is shocked into eating its own fat reserves, it will, apparently, swallow up the thin layer of fat on the pancreas which prevents insulin being created. I think it's the pancreas, but I'm no biologist. I did single integrated science at GSCE like a proper thicko! Whatever the science behind it is, it seems to have worked a treat with Mo. Her nurse calls her a miracle, and she looks a million dollars.
We strolled down to the magic place and communed a little with nature. It felt powerful, somehow. My friend Jo tells me that amazing energies are heading towards Earth at the moment which I reckon we could all do with. And I guess that believing they're there is half the battle. If we start to expect happiness, we'll start to notice it more when we feel it. We'll smile more and happiness will spread. I'm sure the same is true of negativity. Surely the strength of a recession, for example, is governed by how consumers respond to news that there might be a recession? Or am I over-simplifying things? I can sense Brother Edward reading this and hanging his head in shame!
Nathan, bless him, must have texted some of my friends, because I had a series of lovely messages, many of which took the form of little films and photographs. My favourite came from Goddaughter Deia, who was on a trampoline. Her head kept bouncing into shot whilst she sang a deeply scatalogical version of Happy Birthday. There was also a photo from my cousins Matt and Boo, which their three children in Stockholm holding a sign which read "Happy Birthday Ben." Lovely. People are so kind. And inventive.
I spoke to my Mum at lunchtime who suggested I took a trip up to Thaxted, and it struck me that this was the right thing to do. If in doubt, head to the parents! I tried to post some letters before leaving. The queue for the Highgate Post Office stretched out into the street, just like it gets in the run up to Christmas. I hung around, ineffectually hoping it would miraculously disappear if I muttered swear words under my breath. Peering into the shop I noticed that the man at the front of the queue was sending scores of parcels, so I gave up, and decided to go to Muswell Hill en route. I'm not sure what it was about Monday August 8th, but that branch was similarly chocka. I'd paid for 25 minutes' parking, and, after twenty, was no nearer the counters, so gave up and drove to Thaxted in a foul mood.
Thaxted provided me with exactly the tonic I was looking for, not least because my parents' old friend, Mo was there. Mo was a colleague of my father's at the school he taught at and I went to, so she's known me since I was perhaps 8 years old. She lived in Crouch End whilst I was at Mountview and used to take me out for cups of tea and chocolate croissants to make sure I was okay. She sat on the front row at our wedding and is in a lot of the shots. She looks a little like my Mum, so I assume the TV people thought she was my aunt. Frankly, she might as well be. She's an absolute riot and has always reminded me of Joanna Lumley. In the last year she's lost a phenomenal amount of weight after being diagnosed with type two diabetes, which she's actually managed to reverse. There is a revolutionary new treatment plan which the university of Newcastle has created involving fast weight loss which genuinely seems to work. If the body is shocked into eating its own fat reserves, it will, apparently, swallow up the thin layer of fat on the pancreas which prevents insulin being created. I think it's the pancreas, but I'm no biologist. I did single integrated science at GSCE like a proper thicko! Whatever the science behind it is, it seems to have worked a treat with Mo. Her nurse calls her a miracle, and she looks a million dollars.
We strolled down to the magic place and communed a little with nature. It felt powerful, somehow. My friend Jo tells me that amazing energies are heading towards Earth at the moment which I reckon we could all do with. And I guess that believing they're there is half the battle. If we start to expect happiness, we'll start to notice it more when we feel it. We'll smile more and happiness will spread. I'm sure the same is true of negativity. Surely the strength of a recession, for example, is governed by how consumers respond to news that there might be a recession? Or am I over-simplifying things? I can sense Brother Edward reading this and hanging his head in shame!
Monday, 8 August 2016
hot, dry gales
It would appear to be my birthday! Just. As of thirty minutes ago, I'm 42, which I'm told makes me the meaning of life, the universe and everything. I can think of worse things to be. My 43rd year had better be more productive than my 42nd year. Last year was brutal...
Today was all about a glorious lie-in. I haven't had a lie-in since before we went on holiday, and it was just wonderful to cuddle Nathan whilst drifting in and out of consciousness.
We had lunch in the greasy spoon and then went up to Friern Barnet to collect some props for a filming session I'd booked in for this evening. Who knew it could be so difficult to find flammable material in a B and Q? I wanted to create a miniature bonfire so needed the sort of thing you might throw onto a barbecue. I found nothing of the sort. Apparently the barbecue season is over... I would have thought that the barbecue season ran seamlessly into the bonfire season and that flame accelerants might therefore be an all-year-round essential product. Nope.
So I bought a metal dustbin and went to Tesco for a couple of throw-away barbecues. Bad choice. I needed fire, not smouldering coals.
Still, whilst we were up in those parts, we took a trip to a hand car wash place, and got all the sticky stuff that falls from lime trees around our house water-blasted from our roof and windscreen by a clutch of fabulous immigrants wearing wellies.
I came home and started editing together my little film. The majority of footage is now in, and it's good to get a bit of a shape. There's so so much admin to do before we start rehearsals at Sevenoaks on Friday, however, so heaven knows when I'm going to get it finished. I have pages and pages of admin to do. Email upon email to send. I picked up a speeding fine whilst driving home from Northumberland, which is £100 and three points on my license. This is, of course, bad enough, until we factor in the fact that I'm about the only person in the world who only has a paper driving license, which I've somehow lost. So tomorrow I've got to try to sort all that nonsense out. Is it even legal to only have a paper license?
The filming session this evening was with Llio in her garden. Llio has a solo in the fourth movement of the motet, which includes some of the most famous lines that Pepys ever wrote. In the midst of the mayhem of the Great Fire of London, Pepys rushed around his house throwing his most valuable possessions into a cart, and burying some of the others: "did dig a pit, and put our wine in it. And our Parmesan cheese!" As it happened, when Pepys returned to his house after the fire had finished raging, he found it still standing. The wind had changed direction at the last moment, which meant the far south-eastern corner of the city including the Tower of London was saved.
The weather today was very unusual. Hot and dry with high, rather tropical winds. Exactly the sort of weather, in fact, that caused the Great Fire of London!
Today was all about a glorious lie-in. I haven't had a lie-in since before we went on holiday, and it was just wonderful to cuddle Nathan whilst drifting in and out of consciousness.
We had lunch in the greasy spoon and then went up to Friern Barnet to collect some props for a filming session I'd booked in for this evening. Who knew it could be so difficult to find flammable material in a B and Q? I wanted to create a miniature bonfire so needed the sort of thing you might throw onto a barbecue. I found nothing of the sort. Apparently the barbecue season is over... I would have thought that the barbecue season ran seamlessly into the bonfire season and that flame accelerants might therefore be an all-year-round essential product. Nope.
So I bought a metal dustbin and went to Tesco for a couple of throw-away barbecues. Bad choice. I needed fire, not smouldering coals.
Still, whilst we were up in those parts, we took a trip to a hand car wash place, and got all the sticky stuff that falls from lime trees around our house water-blasted from our roof and windscreen by a clutch of fabulous immigrants wearing wellies.
I came home and started editing together my little film. The majority of footage is now in, and it's good to get a bit of a shape. There's so so much admin to do before we start rehearsals at Sevenoaks on Friday, however, so heaven knows when I'm going to get it finished. I have pages and pages of admin to do. Email upon email to send. I picked up a speeding fine whilst driving home from Northumberland, which is £100 and three points on my license. This is, of course, bad enough, until we factor in the fact that I'm about the only person in the world who only has a paper driving license, which I've somehow lost. So tomorrow I've got to try to sort all that nonsense out. Is it even legal to only have a paper license?
The filming session this evening was with Llio in her garden. Llio has a solo in the fourth movement of the motet, which includes some of the most famous lines that Pepys ever wrote. In the midst of the mayhem of the Great Fire of London, Pepys rushed around his house throwing his most valuable possessions into a cart, and burying some of the others: "did dig a pit, and put our wine in it. And our Parmesan cheese!" As it happened, when Pepys returned to his house after the fire had finished raging, he found it still standing. The wind had changed direction at the last moment, which meant the far south-eastern corner of the city including the Tower of London was saved.
The weather today was very unusual. Hot and dry with high, rather tropical winds. Exactly the sort of weather, in fact, that caused the Great Fire of London!
Saturday, 6 August 2016
Cambridge
We've been in Cambridge all day today celebrating my birthday, which, incidentally, is on Monday. It always feels a little fraudulent and previous to celebrate one's birthday before the actual event, but I felt like doing something with a bit of a crowd, and today was the nearest Saturday.
We went there by train, and met at King's Cross just before 10 this morning. The whole of the Northern Line was down, and, by the time Nathan and I had got our acts together, there wasn't enough time to get a rail replacement bus. We booked an Uber car, which felt incredibly decadent. Nathan and I are not taxi users. They're far too costly. But sometimes needs must. Sadly our driver was awful. He kept ignoring the sat nav and making us later and later as a result. Sitting in laborious queues of traffic at the start of a day which is meant to be relaxing is not a lot of fun. But we got there. Just.
My travel companions today were Tina, Sam, Matt, Abbie, Ian, Ted Thornhill, Nathan and Julie Clare. We met up with Brother Edward, Sascha and my parents in Cambridge itself.
These days are always fairly formulaic. We've been doing the same thing, pretty much every year since my 13th birthday. We walk from the train station to Marks and Spencer on the market square to buy a picnic lunch. We stroll around the market itself and buy strawberries, sun glasses and all the things we suddenly think we might need for the rest of the day. At that stage, half of us disappear with my brother to King's College, where we hire a punt. My brother was a student at this particular college, and alumni here get huge privileges, including being able to hire college-owned punts at very special rates.
We went through the college, showing Tina and the gang the amazing dining hall where the students eat decadently (in the style of Harry Potter) and then punted along the backs towards the rest of the group, who were waiting at Scudamore's, the official punt hire place. It's rather nice to be able to punt along the backs in Cambridge. Our trip always takes us up the river and away from the city towards the village of Grantchester, so a few glimpses of some of those iconic sights, like the sublime King's College chapel and the wooden mathematical bridge, is always a bit of a treat. I'm not sure Tina quite felt it was a treat. She'd never been punting before and has a pathological fear of water. She spent most of the first part of the journey clinging to the sides of the boat, expecting the whole thing to capsize.
The Cam in the direction of Grantchester is on a higher elevation, so the punts need to be dragged over rollers by the side of a weir. Whilst the others got on with heaving our punt up the hill, I joined the other group at Scudmore's and we set off down the river in tandem.
Sascha greeted us with the news that he'd seen Stephen Hawkins rolling along the side of the river whilst he'd sat waiting for us. The two gays from Gogglebox were apparently also in the vicinity. They'll almost certainly have caused more of a splash!
The trip up to Grantchester was as it always is. The sun was hot. People swam in the rivers. Young people swung from trees. We were visited by an inquisitive swan. Nathan climbed out of the punt and over a footbridge and plonked himself back inside the boat on the other side. He always does that. There's something pleasingly predictable about the trip to Grantchester. The only difference was the high number of canoeists on the river. Those little bastards can be incredibly irritating. There's a tendency for them to travel in packs, and, whilst they ought to have been fairly nimble and able to navigate the meanders of the river with ease, most were completely incapable of steering, and simply got in the way of the punts. One woman had a right go at us, suggesting we "stopped to let her pass." She'd already crashed into us about nine times, and, on one occasion caused a major pile up of several punts, about nine canoeists and an inflatable dinghy!
We picnicked with my parents in a field half way between Cambridge and Grantchester. We ate too much. We always do.
Upon arriving in Grantchester, we took ourselves to the Orchard cafe, where people eat cream trees under apple, pear and plum trees. It's an iconic location. Virginia Wolf, TS Elliot, Keynes, Brooke and Wittgenstein were all regular customers there in the early 20th Century. One assumes the deck chairs are some of the only things which have changed since those heady days. We bumped into Helen Acton. It was so lovely to see her. I shared a cream tea with Nathan. The sun was incredibly hot. I could feel my forehead burning to a crisp.
We returned to our punts at about 6pm. It's really rather lovely that you can simply leave a punt moored up against the river bank with all of your possessions inside without any fear of things being stolen or trashed. The light was glorious. There wasn't a cloud in the sky. We threw ourselves into the river and had a lovely swim in the reed-infused waters. People have been swimming in Grantchester Meadows for years and years. People have swum on my birthday trips to Cambridge for as long as I can remember. I love tradition.
We sang as we punted back to Cambridge. We always do. We sing in multipart harmony. We sang rounds. We sang folk songs. We sang ABBA, The Beatles, The Mammas and the Papas and loads of show tunes. People seemed rather thrilled to hear a boat load of people singing whilst drifting down the river. It's certainly a somewhat eccentric sight.
We arrived back in Cambridge at about 8pm and had a drink outside the Mill pub whilst watching a group of fully-clothed nutters launching themselves into the Cam from the bridge by Queens College.
The train journey home was accompanied by a glorious sunset which seemed to fill a great swathe of the fenland sky before melting into a ribbon of tangerine-coloured fire on the horizon.
The only thing which was less than perfect was the rail replacement bus ride from kings Cross back to Highgate which took far longer than it should have done, threw us about and then deposited us unceremoniously and without reason at Archway. London can be very boring sometimes!
We went there by train, and met at King's Cross just before 10 this morning. The whole of the Northern Line was down, and, by the time Nathan and I had got our acts together, there wasn't enough time to get a rail replacement bus. We booked an Uber car, which felt incredibly decadent. Nathan and I are not taxi users. They're far too costly. But sometimes needs must. Sadly our driver was awful. He kept ignoring the sat nav and making us later and later as a result. Sitting in laborious queues of traffic at the start of a day which is meant to be relaxing is not a lot of fun. But we got there. Just.
My travel companions today were Tina, Sam, Matt, Abbie, Ian, Ted Thornhill, Nathan and Julie Clare. We met up with Brother Edward, Sascha and my parents in Cambridge itself.
These days are always fairly formulaic. We've been doing the same thing, pretty much every year since my 13th birthday. We walk from the train station to Marks and Spencer on the market square to buy a picnic lunch. We stroll around the market itself and buy strawberries, sun glasses and all the things we suddenly think we might need for the rest of the day. At that stage, half of us disappear with my brother to King's College, where we hire a punt. My brother was a student at this particular college, and alumni here get huge privileges, including being able to hire college-owned punts at very special rates.
We went through the college, showing Tina and the gang the amazing dining hall where the students eat decadently (in the style of Harry Potter) and then punted along the backs towards the rest of the group, who were waiting at Scudamore's, the official punt hire place. It's rather nice to be able to punt along the backs in Cambridge. Our trip always takes us up the river and away from the city towards the village of Grantchester, so a few glimpses of some of those iconic sights, like the sublime King's College chapel and the wooden mathematical bridge, is always a bit of a treat. I'm not sure Tina quite felt it was a treat. She'd never been punting before and has a pathological fear of water. She spent most of the first part of the journey clinging to the sides of the boat, expecting the whole thing to capsize.
The Cam in the direction of Grantchester is on a higher elevation, so the punts need to be dragged over rollers by the side of a weir. Whilst the others got on with heaving our punt up the hill, I joined the other group at Scudmore's and we set off down the river in tandem.
Sascha greeted us with the news that he'd seen Stephen Hawkins rolling along the side of the river whilst he'd sat waiting for us. The two gays from Gogglebox were apparently also in the vicinity. They'll almost certainly have caused more of a splash!
The trip up to Grantchester was as it always is. The sun was hot. People swam in the rivers. Young people swung from trees. We were visited by an inquisitive swan. Nathan climbed out of the punt and over a footbridge and plonked himself back inside the boat on the other side. He always does that. There's something pleasingly predictable about the trip to Grantchester. The only difference was the high number of canoeists on the river. Those little bastards can be incredibly irritating. There's a tendency for them to travel in packs, and, whilst they ought to have been fairly nimble and able to navigate the meanders of the river with ease, most were completely incapable of steering, and simply got in the way of the punts. One woman had a right go at us, suggesting we "stopped to let her pass." She'd already crashed into us about nine times, and, on one occasion caused a major pile up of several punts, about nine canoeists and an inflatable dinghy!
We picnicked with my parents in a field half way between Cambridge and Grantchester. We ate too much. We always do.
Upon arriving in Grantchester, we took ourselves to the Orchard cafe, where people eat cream trees under apple, pear and plum trees. It's an iconic location. Virginia Wolf, TS Elliot, Keynes, Brooke and Wittgenstein were all regular customers there in the early 20th Century. One assumes the deck chairs are some of the only things which have changed since those heady days. We bumped into Helen Acton. It was so lovely to see her. I shared a cream tea with Nathan. The sun was incredibly hot. I could feel my forehead burning to a crisp.
We returned to our punts at about 6pm. It's really rather lovely that you can simply leave a punt moored up against the river bank with all of your possessions inside without any fear of things being stolen or trashed. The light was glorious. There wasn't a cloud in the sky. We threw ourselves into the river and had a lovely swim in the reed-infused waters. People have been swimming in Grantchester Meadows for years and years. People have swum on my birthday trips to Cambridge for as long as I can remember. I love tradition.
We sang as we punted back to Cambridge. We always do. We sing in multipart harmony. We sang rounds. We sang folk songs. We sang ABBA, The Beatles, The Mammas and the Papas and loads of show tunes. People seemed rather thrilled to hear a boat load of people singing whilst drifting down the river. It's certainly a somewhat eccentric sight.
We arrived back in Cambridge at about 8pm and had a drink outside the Mill pub whilst watching a group of fully-clothed nutters launching themselves into the Cam from the bridge by Queens College.
The train journey home was accompanied by a glorious sunset which seemed to fill a great swathe of the fenland sky before melting into a ribbon of tangerine-coloured fire on the horizon.
The only thing which was less than perfect was the rail replacement bus ride from kings Cross back to Highgate which took far longer than it should have done, threw us about and then deposited us unceremoniously and without reason at Archway. London can be very boring sometimes!
Somerset
We drove down to Somerset yesterday to attend Nathan's cousin's wedding. It was actually quite a stressful journey from about Bristol onwards on the M5. The traffic got heavy and we suddenly realised that the journey to Taunton was considerably longer than we'd thought it was. Nathan got so anxious at one point that I couldn't even calm him down with ABBA!
As it happened the wedding kicked off a little late, so we made it with five minutes to spare. The bride looked radiant. The groom looked handsome. The bride's brother sang beautifully. No one could hear the registrar. The happy couple's very cute daughter read The Owl and the Pussy Cat, and taught the registrar a thing or two about projection!
The ceremony took place outside, which was really very lovely. The grounds of the "castle" where the wedding took place were decked out to resemble a church fete. There was a bouncy castle, a giant Connect Four, a "splat the rat" and all manner of things like ice cream stalls.
It was a rather charming day all in all. The bride's father delivered a very moving speech. The food was a Greek barbecue as a result of the groom being Greek Cypriot. Lots of his family seemed highly perplexed by Brexit. I felt embarrassed all over again.
We slipped out early so that we could get back to London at a decent time. Today is a big day. We're celebrating my birthday!
As it happened the wedding kicked off a little late, so we made it with five minutes to spare. The bride looked radiant. The groom looked handsome. The bride's brother sang beautifully. No one could hear the registrar. The happy couple's very cute daughter read The Owl and the Pussy Cat, and taught the registrar a thing or two about projection!
The ceremony took place outside, which was really very lovely. The grounds of the "castle" where the wedding took place were decked out to resemble a church fete. There was a bouncy castle, a giant Connect Four, a "splat the rat" and all manner of things like ice cream stalls.
It was a rather charming day all in all. The bride's father delivered a very moving speech. The food was a Greek barbecue as a result of the groom being Greek Cypriot. Lots of his family seemed highly perplexed by Brexit. I felt embarrassed all over again.
We slipped out early so that we could get back to London at a decent time. Today is a big day. We're celebrating my birthday!
Friday, 5 August 2016
Godfathered
I had a classic anxiety dream last night. I think it was a response to all the admin I'm doing at the moment, and the fact that we go into rehearsals for Brass and I feel there's a ludicrously tall mountain to climb before any of that can happen. There's also anxiety attached to not being in work and needing to be in work. Call it a post-holiday come down.
The dream was very bizarre. I'd gone back to visit my old music department at the University of York and was trying to find my composition tutor because I wanted to give him a copy of the Pepys album. When I found him, I realised I'd forgotten to bring any copies of the album with me and asked if I could send it through the post. He sucked his teeth and looked embarrassed. "Thing is" he said, "I'm not really that interested in hearing it. You were a fairly promising composer, but your laziness has stopped you from amounting to anything." I tried to remonstrate and was about to tell him that Our Gay Wedding had been BAFTA nominated but then a weird woman came into the space. She started talking over the top of me about the fact that she'd bought a lovely pair of shoes because she was so miserable in her marriage. My tutor stopped looking at me and started to sympathise with her plight. I stood there for a while and then started to feel like a bit of a gooseberry; "I ought to be going..." I said to my tutor. "Okay" he said, "great to see you..." And then I left.
This morning I went to see Philippa and my two god daughters, who were having a play date with Lily and Jack, who live around the corner. I think it's fairly safe to say that I was well and truly godfathered.
Godfathered (verb): Possessing a weakness not present in actual parents or professional carers which tolerates (and encourages) a level of bad behaviour in children to the detriment of the godfather's appearance, health or dignity.
I got covered from head to toe in face paint. I got swung in a basket until I nearly chundered. I got embroiled in a plot to lock Philippa out of the house and then was prevented by force from opening the front door to let Philippa back in. It was a lot of fun!
We ate at the Hackney City farm, which is a charmingly ramshackle place in which to have lunch. Much or most of the food is vegetarian. I had the most delicious plate of food: Scrambled eggs on sour dough bread with avocado and Halloumi. The kids ate pasta with pesto.
We then went plum-scrumping in Haggerston Park. I have no idea why that participle park is filled with plum trees. I can only assume there was some kind of post war initiative to bring fruit to inner city kids. The trees are simply laden with fruit, and there aren't any wasps about at the moment to make a mess of them. We were mostly picking up windfalls, but I also got a big stick and gently encouraged a few more down from the trees. Philippa regularly goes searching for plums in the park, with which she makes lovely crumbles and beautiful tarts.
When I arrived at the house, the kids were all under the conservatory table searching for dead insects. They found a cricket, a wasp and a bluebottle, prompting one of the visiting kids to say, "oh my God, this house is so creepy!" Deia looked at her friend and agreed, "they fall down from the spiders' webs in the roof."
I had to come home with my face and hair covered in pink, blue and purple face paint. No one on the tube seemed to find it remotely funny, although I could see everyone staring. The assumption in London is often that a person who looks a little eccentric is extremely mad and must be avoided at all cost. Someone came up to the person sitting next to me on a bench at Old Street to ask a question about the Northern Line. When I answered instead, she refused to make eye contact with me. Maybe she saw the bright purple nose and immediately assumed I was an alcoholic?
This evening we drove into central London and parked up on the South Bank somewhere near Lambeth Palace. We were filming yet another set of sequences for the Pepys video, this time with Trevor, a Canadian opera singer with one of my favourite voices in the world and Abbie, who hugely generously came along to record a few more sequences which would have been done by members of the Rebel Chorus who are out of the country at the moment.
We filmed opposite Big Ben, realising in the process quite how much of the beauty of Central London we take for granted. It's a stunning city and we are incredibly lucky to live here. As ever, with this film, we had a riot playing around with fire, and the four of us made a rather brilliant crew. We all performed in front of the camera, Trevor and Nathan did lighting, Trevor, Abbie and Nathan did sound. Nathan managed the pyrotechnics. Who needs a gaffer and a dolly grip when you have four musicians?!
We filmed Abbie near the London Eye, and were somewhat astonished when, mid way through her shot, a fox appeared from the bushes, found a half eaten ice cream, and sat, very happily tucking into it no more than a metre away from us. Nathan shone a torch on the little fella, and he seemed more than happy to let me film him for a while. He may well appear in the film!
The day ended on Leake Street, that fabulous graffiti-lined street behind Waterloo which basically runs underneath a series of railway arches. It's open day and night, and is always full of rather edgy looking people, but the place provides a lovely looking backdrop for any film you might want to look a bit urban and gritty. I was particularly pleased with a shot we did of Abbie there, walking along with a lantern in her hand, Nathan creating a pool of light on the floor in front of her with a torch. Very beautiful. I hope they all edit together well because I'm very pleased with a lot of what we've shot.
I have three more people left to film...
The dream was very bizarre. I'd gone back to visit my old music department at the University of York and was trying to find my composition tutor because I wanted to give him a copy of the Pepys album. When I found him, I realised I'd forgotten to bring any copies of the album with me and asked if I could send it through the post. He sucked his teeth and looked embarrassed. "Thing is" he said, "I'm not really that interested in hearing it. You were a fairly promising composer, but your laziness has stopped you from amounting to anything." I tried to remonstrate and was about to tell him that Our Gay Wedding had been BAFTA nominated but then a weird woman came into the space. She started talking over the top of me about the fact that she'd bought a lovely pair of shoes because she was so miserable in her marriage. My tutor stopped looking at me and started to sympathise with her plight. I stood there for a while and then started to feel like a bit of a gooseberry; "I ought to be going..." I said to my tutor. "Okay" he said, "great to see you..." And then I left.
This morning I went to see Philippa and my two god daughters, who were having a play date with Lily and Jack, who live around the corner. I think it's fairly safe to say that I was well and truly godfathered.
Godfathered (verb): Possessing a weakness not present in actual parents or professional carers which tolerates (and encourages) a level of bad behaviour in children to the detriment of the godfather's appearance, health or dignity.
I got covered from head to toe in face paint. I got swung in a basket until I nearly chundered. I got embroiled in a plot to lock Philippa out of the house and then was prevented by force from opening the front door to let Philippa back in. It was a lot of fun!
We ate at the Hackney City farm, which is a charmingly ramshackle place in which to have lunch. Much or most of the food is vegetarian. I had the most delicious plate of food: Scrambled eggs on sour dough bread with avocado and Halloumi. The kids ate pasta with pesto.
We then went plum-scrumping in Haggerston Park. I have no idea why that participle park is filled with plum trees. I can only assume there was some kind of post war initiative to bring fruit to inner city kids. The trees are simply laden with fruit, and there aren't any wasps about at the moment to make a mess of them. We were mostly picking up windfalls, but I also got a big stick and gently encouraged a few more down from the trees. Philippa regularly goes searching for plums in the park, with which she makes lovely crumbles and beautiful tarts.
When I arrived at the house, the kids were all under the conservatory table searching for dead insects. They found a cricket, a wasp and a bluebottle, prompting one of the visiting kids to say, "oh my God, this house is so creepy!" Deia looked at her friend and agreed, "they fall down from the spiders' webs in the roof."
I had to come home with my face and hair covered in pink, blue and purple face paint. No one on the tube seemed to find it remotely funny, although I could see everyone staring. The assumption in London is often that a person who looks a little eccentric is extremely mad and must be avoided at all cost. Someone came up to the person sitting next to me on a bench at Old Street to ask a question about the Northern Line. When I answered instead, she refused to make eye contact with me. Maybe she saw the bright purple nose and immediately assumed I was an alcoholic?
This evening we drove into central London and parked up on the South Bank somewhere near Lambeth Palace. We were filming yet another set of sequences for the Pepys video, this time with Trevor, a Canadian opera singer with one of my favourite voices in the world and Abbie, who hugely generously came along to record a few more sequences which would have been done by members of the Rebel Chorus who are out of the country at the moment.
We filmed opposite Big Ben, realising in the process quite how much of the beauty of Central London we take for granted. It's a stunning city and we are incredibly lucky to live here. As ever, with this film, we had a riot playing around with fire, and the four of us made a rather brilliant crew. We all performed in front of the camera, Trevor and Nathan did lighting, Trevor, Abbie and Nathan did sound. Nathan managed the pyrotechnics. Who needs a gaffer and a dolly grip when you have four musicians?!
We filmed Abbie near the London Eye, and were somewhat astonished when, mid way through her shot, a fox appeared from the bushes, found a half eaten ice cream, and sat, very happily tucking into it no more than a metre away from us. Nathan shone a torch on the little fella, and he seemed more than happy to let me film him for a while. He may well appear in the film!
The day ended on Leake Street, that fabulous graffiti-lined street behind Waterloo which basically runs underneath a series of railway arches. It's open day and night, and is always full of rather edgy looking people, but the place provides a lovely looking backdrop for any film you might want to look a bit urban and gritty. I was particularly pleased with a shot we did of Abbie there, walking along with a lantern in her hand, Nathan creating a pool of light on the floor in front of her with a torch. Very beautiful. I hope they all edit together well because I'm very pleased with a lot of what we've shot.
I have three more people left to film...
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