Wednesday, August 27th, 2008
Slow cooker
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Today
Very tired from yesterday.
The cooker arrived, but the fitters declared they could not fit it because there was a socket within 75 cm of the cooker's top. I had been asked about this when Ma bought it, but assumed that seeing the house was rewired last year the new socket would be up to spec. It probably was but the rules for gas cookers have been changed. They took the new cooker back and will redeliver after I have replaced the socket with a blank fascia.
Saw a rat in the back garden this afternoon. A first for here. I was in bare feet otherwise I may have gone after it with a stick; not that I would have got anywhere near it.
Yesterday
Another trip to London with the pie (which seems to be tougher than a Vickers Wellington). Walked from City Thameslink to Clerkenwell, via The Guildhall, again; but did not enter the Barbican this time, so was quicker and much less angry.
Met John from the Sessions House at the Curved Angel. It is a lovely cafe and the food is good, but it is an odd space with odd furnishings. The Priestley Night is a gesture, but I am not taking it any less seriously. I need to think more about the staging before the show. The start time is now 5.30 for 6.00, and I have Felicity to play the pie in.
The meeting with John was about the Curry and Kipling Night, and was very productive. They have already sold 20 tickets and they have not started trying yet. John and I talked about the possibility of doing a second show the next week if it sells out.
I then went to the Betsy Trotwood, where I seemed to talk to everyone who came in, on account of the pie. Talked to an Essex lad called Gary, and several women from an office party celebrating a forthcoming wedding, one of whom insisted on giving me wine and hearing poetry.
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Monday, August 25th, 2008
Song and five storeys
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It's been a relaxing couple of domestic days. I am dithering a little about the start time for the Priestley. I have said 5.30 pm. but have not sent out any pr yet, apart from some flyers. For various reasons I am thinking of making it 5.30 for 6.00.
Today I got down on my knees with a scrubbing brush to clean out the cooker corner, ready for the arrival of the new one.
Yesterday we all sat and watched Songs of Praise. Mother tried singing, as she usually does, and stopped in frustration, as usual. I pointed out she should sing the alto rather than the soprano part; she could sing very well, and once sang on Finnish radio during the last World War (in which Finland fought the USSR). The trouble is she does not sing at all now, does not warm up, and when she starts she gets angry and depressed if she cannot do it right straight off (I recognize a lot of myself there).
After that Dad started singing along to All things bright and beautiful and we all joined in. A first, and a lovely moment.
One of the songs actual was to the tune she sang on radion. Obviously the words Ma sang were Finnish, but it gives me a chance to find it. The details as given on the BBC were:
Name: DEAR LORD AND FATHER OF MANKIND
Words: J.G. Whittier (1807-92)
Music: Repton
C. Hubert H. Parry (1848 - 1918)
From a song in his oratorio 'Judith'.
Ma then told a story I had not heard before; about my Uncle Nicholi (I am not sure of the spelling) spending an army leave in a five storey building in Helsinki (there cannot have been many there then). He got very drunk and fell asleep in the toilet. When he woke up he opened the door to discover there was nothing there but sky, on account of the rest of the building being blown up by a Soviet bomb! Apparently it made the front pages of the Finnish newspapers. It reminded me of the P.G.Wodehouse story of the man that slept through the San Fransico earthquake, and it made me very proud of my family.
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Saturday, August 23rd, 2008
Up on the roof.
A very good day, and unusual, even by my wide standards. I discovered the verdant secret alley of cats in Peckham; saved someone from getting lost in their own park; got on a roof and helped fit a window; played rhythm recorder; found someone to pipe in my pie; cubed pork; and ate a lot and drank a bit: but before any more on all that that, an important announcement.
As things stand I will only be selling 25 tickets. I almost certainly will be able to sell more, but the venue has not done a function like this before, so the actual sensible capacity still needs to be sorted out for a show.
I went to Peckham Rye this morning to visit Kate at her house, mostly because she has, sort of, offered me a show in her 'communal space'. Turns out she does not live there any more, but her lodger, Sarah let me in, talked briefly about her own poetry career, then had to go somewhere. By this time Kate had arrived with John, the bloke who was putting in a new kitchen roof window.
The 'road' has two terraces with 3 foot gardens, a 3 foot path, and a gate at the entrance, which is not locked, so it is not a gated entrance. The houses are small, with between 1 and 2 rooms on each floor depending on conversions. The gardens are so well kept that it regularly wins awards. It also has the highest concentration of cats I can remember seeing in a public space. I could do a show in the communal space,
I ended up climbing up a ladder and helping John and his mate to put the window in. it was a proper job!
Kate walked me around her local park. We were looking for ice creams, and would have spent a time on the search until I asked, and then insisted on going the way we were told.
I also met Kate's mate Felicity, who is generous with her wine, wants to come to the Priestley, and played On Ilkley Moor bah'tat on recorder, without music, with Kate. They even got me to play rhythm with two notes. Kate cannot make the Night, but Felicity up for piping in the pie.
Friday, August 22nd, 2008
Cooking with gas!
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Spent the morning doing bits of fixing and tidying on my Bradwan site. Not much as you would notice, but the links on the poem page have had some updating.
After a lunch of a boiled Co-op bacon joint (and very nice it was) took Ma in a taxi to Currys to look at gas and duel fuel cookers. She did not like the burners on any of the ones she felt she could afford; and I insisted she get a double oven instead of a low oven with a grill above it, so she did not have to bend to the floor to use an oven.
We walked down to Comet, where we found a New World cooker with a top oven big enough for any roast she would cook for her and Dad, reasonable burners, and mid priced.
While we were sorting out the details I got a call from the artistic director of The New Cinema Chichester, inviting me to their showing of A Month in the Country. One of the things I discovered from him is that the letterhead I have been using has a wrong number for my mobile. Nowt like being an idiot to make sure folk don't call you!
We got a taxi back from Comet, and Ma had a minor angina attack when we got home, but that is par for the course. It was another stroke of good fortune that I was here when the cooker broke. Trying to sort it out on their own would have been incredibly stressful, possibly to the point of danger. As it is, she has had a trip out, told me and the taxi driver about what the area used to be like when she walked to work at Suggs, Philips and M.E.L. and they are getting a much better cooker on Wednesday.
I then went to the local shops to buy a chicken for Sunday. Ma reckons on pot roasting it, but I would like it boiled.
Later on Matt called round and we went for a drink at The Grapes in Pease Pottage. Good pub, which is being shut next week! The brewery (Hall and Woodhouse) are not saying what will happen, which means it will be a f***ing house soon. It was the last pub I knew in the south with an open air gents, and was good and busy today. I will miss it much more than rat hole pubs near me that have shut and gone for even (all of them boarded up for years now). They had no idea, hope or trade; and sold vile beer. The Grapes is a lively business, and once it is gone, even in it's tidied up modern form, it will be an irreplaceable loss.
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Thursday, August 21st, 2008
We'll fly high in the pie...
I wrote before I got broadband in my parents that i found it very difficult to work when I am stopping with them. Now I can. It is not just broadband, but the only going on-line in the cheap periods, and rushing so as to not cost too much was probably enough added stress to get to red levels.
Did a new set of flyers from last year's Priestley Night last night and this morning. Took them up to London mid morning. I took the foot wide dot-com pie from last year. 
alt=" Glyn Watkins with his home made foot wide pie, linking to Priestley Night Page "
title="Glyn Watkins with his home made foot wide pie, linking to Priestley Night Page ">
As you can see (or maybe not on myspace) I was using a tray last year, which was made from MDF; heavy and awkward. Today I used a sling made out of half a bedsheet. It was Ma's suggestion, based on what her father used to carry seed when he was broadcasting. It worked really well.
The was a 6 - 7 year old lad going to London Zoo for the first time with his auntie and grandpa. He was saying things about the tack, stations, and roads. As I said to the adults "The trip there is always better than the there." The aunt used to do the accounts of J.B. Priestley's daughters; who she said was a music therapist and 'odd', or word's to that effect.
Got off at City Thamelink and walked to the Guildhall via the Warwick Street, where lived the artist who painted Thomas Britton's potrait (John Wollaston).
Susie, receptionist in the Guildhall (where I dropped a letter for the member for Cheap, who talked to me at the Cheapside Market) was impressed with the pie.
Then walked to Farringdon Station, via the Barbican; where I got lost as usual in this abomination of concrete! One of my worst ever diabetic hypos was in the early eighties, when I went to see a Charlie Chaplin silent film in this place's cinema. I would of got lost getting back to the Tube anyway, but being in hypo gave it a nightmare quality.
I had fixed up to meet Kate, who I met at the ICA, to talk about possible Carr and Castleford stuff. I stood outside Farringdown Station for 45 minutes, but seeing I had the foot wide I was happy. Several people asked about it and expressed interest in the Priestley & Pie Night, although one drunken cow forced the crust off. My reaction was limited to telling her exactly how to get off.
Had a quick meeting and a drink with Kate, then gave her a very quick tour of Clerkenwell. Even managed to call into the Curved Angel.
From the reaction I got today I would be very disappointed not to sell a dozen or more tickets for the Priestley Night. The problem may be what to do if I sell more than 20 though. Roy, the manager, reckons they can easily squeeze in more than 30, but I need to go in on a quiet day soon, and see how. It may be that I do not print more than 25, and if they sell out I have obviously under priced them at a tenner.
Ended up at Mornington Crescent by various means, then walked down to St. Pancras, for a pint at the Betjeman, where I think Evette said I was not one of the ordinary herd, when I showed the pie to her and her workmates.
This may be the last trip for this pie. The new cracks means it may simply fall apart. Trouble is the oven door here has just broke, so baking a new one will be complicated.
Monday, August 18th, 2008
Ma 87
Did the usual Monday commute, but in reverse (and Lucy Kellaway's column was the least funny for a long while).
There are mixed reasons for this trip. Ma is 87 today, and I was worried about her angina; and I had 3 Clerkenwell venues that could not make their mind up about the Priestley Night, that I was supposed to call today.
Ma has a virus, probably the one I had; but instead of taking to her bed she is up and straining herself, then moaning about feeling bad, then getting an angina attack (but not as many as I thought).
The 3 venues all had to knock me back; but as I was supping a pint in the Three Kings I looked across at the Curved Angel Cafe and a light went on. The manager, Roy, wants to make the place known as a possible venue, so was well up for the show. We need to sort details so I can price it, but I cannot see anything that will stop me doing the night (or early evening rather).
Saturday, August 16th, 2008
Snickling York
alt=" York Minster, drawn from the City wall between Victoria gate and Micklegate Bar, about 5 pm. 16.8.08 "
title="York Minster, drawn from the City wall between Victoria gate and Micklegate Bar, about 5 pm. 16.8.08 ">
Did the York trip with Joe Ogden today. He does not get out enough and I always used to spend too much time on my tod. He enjoys being shown thngs and I enjoy telling people things, so a good day was had by all.
I would not normal go to York on a Saturday but if I had not done it today I doubt we could have done it for weeks, and at least you can get a cheap day return ticket before 9.30 am. On a weekday 11.00 am. is the earliest possible time to get to York cheaply, and on a fine day that is when it starts to fill up. We got there a little after 9.00 am and did the first two thirds of the Snickleways walk before noon, so we missed the massive crowds, but only just.
I always take Visitors to York along part of the Snickleway route, but this was the first time in decades I had walked it from the beginning nearly all the way through. It was also the first time Joe had been for a decade (the last time he drove, which he no longer does, with his wife, who he later lost) and it was a very fractured journey back in time for both of us. More so for me because I visit a lot, so the 'new' bits and slight changes were more noticeable.
We called in ever charity shop we passed. I got 3 Shire Books (candles, shoemaking and Victorian farmers) and an early edition of Snickleways as a gift. What I could not find was a copy of the 1947 Estra Clerk map.
We stopped for our first pints in the Blue Bell. We did a little bit more of the Snickles after, but when we walked down Pope's Head Alley (which used to be deserted apart from a charity shop, smell, and had nobody going down it; now it is packed with shops) it had many folk using it, and High Ousegate was packed; so I decide to leave the rest and cross the river.
We called in the Golden Ball, then the Swan (a first for me) on the Ball's recommendation. Had fish and chips, and walked a little of the wall (where I drew the above, and Joe snoozed). Then called in The Brigantes Bar (where I talked to the manager about a possible Priestley and pie, or Curry and Kipling night); then the Ackhorne; then home. I was feeling very tired when we got back, but Joe went off for more beer.
We obviously talked a lot, but perhaps the most important thing for me was discussing the Edinburgh Festival. Joe has produced and worked on the Fringe several times; and it is now not an impossible aim for me.
Wednesday, August 13th, 2008
Walking back to beeriness
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I have taken 8 pats from the pint paddle; but I have also walked about 8 miles from Castleford to South Milford, so that's OK then.
I always thought Cas was a strange closet of a place. Not bad, but very odd to most outsiders. Industry, mining and farming mixed up in a way you only seem to get in South Yorkshire and north Nottinghamshire. I got there in the morning and wanted to go to the library and museum, but it was not clear from my map exactly where it was, and the building on the main street with library carved above the door looked like it had been shut for years. I thought they must have built a new one so I asked in a shop, and was told that was it, but it was shut Coz eets Winsdee. So obviously the official parts of Cas shut all day Wednesday! I also heard the strongest accent since I was last in Glasgow. He was talking on his mobile and I could only just understand what he was saying.
My first sight of the Channel 4 bridge was from the old road bridge. My first sight was disappointing, it looked ordinary. Even close up I thought it looked fussy. It snakes across the river just below the weir and has seats made by bolting metal blocks as separators on curved wood blocks. They look like something to do mountain bike stunts on.
Once I stepped on though all my doubts were swept away. The river was in spate and the roaring weight of weir makes a breathtaking force, and the the details of the bridge makes it possible to feel it, and the care and imagination makes the makes theatre, including a wrecked barge below it and just under the bridge, even better; especially by not showing off like the one across the Thames from Bankside does. The weir's the thing; the curves gives everyone multiple view points, and the wood inlaid iron slts that make the floor means you can see the fiver below, and makes it feel like a seaside pier.
After that I crossed the canal, or navigation rather, that cuts off the loop of the River Aire that Castleford sits on. The pavement at that bridge is very narrow, and 3 lads were coming the other way, so I waited. One of tha lads thanked me, which surprised and pleased me. A simple but increasing rare common courtesy that reflects well on Castleford.
I then walked down the Navigation a little way and watched a JCB trying to pick up a large, rust retort from the shut chemical or coal works.
I then used the footpath to the Fairburn road that runs along the edge of several nature reserves; mostly on the edge of a semi reed bed, and part of that on duck boards. I saw a large variety of life, from a tiny frog to many massive hawker dragonflies, the sort that look like biplanes from the front or back.
Some of the fields have been harvested (including the one I know best, between South Milford station and village) but not all. I stopped by a field of barley because it was making a cracking and popping noise. I am pretty sure it was the barley and not, for instance,, a out of sight stream. I must remember to ask about this.
At Fairburn I had two pints of Sam Smith's bitter which cost £1.32 each!
I then walked to Lumby on the road, over the recently built A1(M) (a fine sight) and under an amazing set of pylons feeding off a big relay station.
The last bit was round the edges of a couple of fields and onto South Street, South Milford, and into the Black Bull, where I only had two pints, and had a chat with a bloke who had played at Crawley Town's ground for Castleford Tigers reserves. Apparently London Broncos played there reserve games there for a while, something I did not know.
I then got the train to Leeds and had a lovely time in The Grove. The fit joiner was there with her bloke. I cannot have seen them for a year or more. She told him she had some of my poetry at home (I had forgotten I had sold her a book) and that i wrote really good poetry.
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Monday, August 11th, 2008
Pie in my sky
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I have not had enough physical activity lately, so I carried a rucksack of stuff down to a charity shop.
Made some phone calls about the Priestley Night, and there is now a possibility of doing it in a London pie and mash shop!
I got a mail from a friend I made at the ICA showing of A Month in the Country apologising for her and her mate not making it to the Little Britton Festival (but her and her mate bought tickets, so good for them!). Turns out she lives near one of the pie shops, and is willing to sponsor me to do a private show for her and her colleagues!
I also got a mail from Kenith Trodd, producer of A Month in the Country, asking for info about possible print locations!
A friend went to York last week. I offered to show her and her family around the snickleways of York. It turned out to be impractical, but whilst waiting i got my copy of The Snckleways of York(by Mark W. Jones0 out to reread. Iknow most of them off my heart but it is the first time in years I read it from front to back. I then got out the copy of the 1947 map I bought the first time I went to York (with my brother in 1976). As a result I now understand the layout of York properly, for the first time, ever. This is a strange, as I could get from most places within the city, to anywhere else, but often by a long way round.
I want to go to York now, but I also want to walk from Castleford to South Milford. These two trips being in the way of a holiday!
On the bus back from town (I was not looking for too much exercise) a woman sat next to me that I knew I knew; so I asked. Turns out she used to work for Bradford City, in the days went I went there a lot.
She told me she quit because she was having to work ...12 to 14 hours some days, for no thanks, or anything else! Recently I got a e-news mail from Bradford City, passed on from Mike, editor of City Gent, asking for volunteers to print names on team shirts! As I said in the general reply, it beggers belief. They are a limited company, but football clubs can usually call on lots of willing volunteers. I said they had obviously abused so many people that they had to send out a general mail begging for free labour. I would have not mentioned it here (and my reply apparently caused a fuss), but this meeting on the bus shows me I am telling something like the truth.
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Friday, August 8th, 2008
Glyn the Film
Yesterday was the first healthy and totally relaxed day I can remember for a long time. I am doing quite a few small but vital things for the Clerkenwell Curry and Kipling show; and there are lively e-mails being exchanged about the details of the event. This is going to be big, we are aiming to sell a hundred tickets; and raise a four figure sum for charity. Tickets will be £25 (including the curry). There will be more details, including how to buy tickets, soon.
The Ilkley Curry and Kipling looks far less likely to happen. The owners of last year's venue (Cains Brewery) went into administration today. The administrators are running the brewery and estate as a going concern, and buyers are already lining up; but it was hard enough getting to talk to the manager as it was.
The Priestley also looks dodgy. I finally got a quote today, which would mean having to charge £15, for pie, peas, and a sticky pud; plus the show of course. It is do-able, but there is not much time, and I want to go down to Crawley once before the 13th September. Thoughts welcome.
Glyn the Film
My scene was filmed Wednesday afternoon.I do not know the name of the film or my character, and I did not manage to learn my lines; but seeing Joe Ogden (the director) was the other character in the scene, and had not learnt any, he could not shout at me.
I played a pathologist examining a corpse. We ended up taping the lines to the shroud! Almost every line was filmed at least 3 different ways; each way filmed 3 times. I did OK, although how well I look will be more down to the editing than any acting I did. I enjoyed it a lot; even though it did have an air of unreality; it did not seem like I did anything at all.
Tuesday, August 5th, 2008
Getting better all the time...
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I have played Civilisation II when I am ill or depressed for as long as I have had an iMac. I was playing it in the midst of pneumonia when the news of 9/11 started filtering through the radio. I started playing it as soon as my brother left last Thursday morning; but it took me days to realise I was ill, and I did not realise how ill until I started recovering.
I do not know if it was flu, it may have been a cold and what used to be called 'nervous exhaustion' (although that was something only the well off suffered from, so I would not have been allowed to have it).
I have had a sleeping holiday because of it, apart from when the lads next door come home from work at 2.30 am. to play loud music (and I have been ill enough to return to sleep after putting earplugs in, and the noise comes in irregular but short bursts.
I have to catch up with, including thanks for the shows. I also have to get on with trying to sort the Priestley Night for the 13th Sept (his birthday and mine) very quickly, or it will be too late. The London Curry & Kipling on the other hand will take a lot of work, but because most of it is being done by capable others, I can focus on the actual performance; which I will enjoy doing.
I called Tamar today for performance advice and to tell her how the shows went. We ended up talking about families; and when she told me that Kenneth Branagh's parents still think he should get a proper job it put my issues with my dad into perspective, and made me laugh.
My next film role
I am going to be in a micro budget vampire film produced and directed by my mate Joe Ogden. I will be playing a pathologist in one scene.
Garden
I managed to do a small amount of gardening today. Being away for so long meant that most of the wild strawberries were lost, and the peas dried in the pod. Even if I had harvested them properly I am not sure they are worth sowing next year. They are a dwarf variety Pisum sativum that need staking, but are low enough for the slugs and snails to get to the leaves, and the yield seems to be much less than a dozen pods per plant. If I plant them next year I will be tempted to plant an old fashioned, tall variety; and I am already plant to cut buddlia canes to make a proper support.
The beans (another dwarf called Ferrari) were a complete failure, but here and at my parents.
The four sweet corns I planted are all now growing fast, but I have probably put them in too late for them to flower and set seed.
The cat that sleeps by the compost bin is allowing me to come within 2 metres, as long as I walk slowly and do not look at it, but no more.
Did two shops today for essentials. Lidl for ground coffee, razors and shaving gel; Nettos for cans, pickles and alcohol. All I need now is some long life milk and some small cartons of fruit juice and I will be ready for the next illness.
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Friday, August 1st, 2008
Back to basic
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After one of my productions I do often feel like what has to be shovelled up after the Lord mayor's Show; and two in a fortnight was a fair load. I also reckon I have a cold or hayfever now.
I stayed in Crawley for 3 days after the Little Britton Show, and my brother Basil arrived on leave the next afternoon. He had intended coming on the Tuesday, but listened to my concern about the pair of us being at the parents in the days before the show.
As it turned out that was a benefit to us both. My father was getting nasty before the show, and got really so afterwards, but by then the important bit was over. He then came back with me to Bradford on Monday; and I took him out on Wednesday (bus to Leeds, Whitelocks, the Grove; train to Ilkley; bus to Keighley, the Red Pig, Boltmakers; bus to Thornton, the Blue Boar; bus to Girlington, the Red Lion. We had a good time).
Over the last fortnight I have talked a lot to both ma and Basil about the family, especially my father. We are all less mad than we used to be, and dad's psychologically issues are perhaps the most improved; but he never talks about what is going on inside, physically or mentally. I am not a great believer in letting things out, but it has been a life long conflict coping with a man that reveals nothing. The last but one trip down was so I could go with in to a potentially critical appointment about why he is suffering from anaemia; but it was rearranged at short notice twice, and finally happened the day before the South Milford show. Ma had a cold, so he went alone, and the rest of us have not managed to find out what happened.
While he will admit to physical pain if cornered, it is impossible for him to talk about the anxiety that has been a constant presence for him. The rest of us have it as well, but we can all talk about it.
Knowing all this does not make it much easier dealing with him when he is playing the nasty games his father played with him (and i got more details about my grandfather from ma - if I was offered a trip in a time machine then the chance of killing I would end up killing my grandfather would would be an attraction).
Anyroad, enough already. I have no children, and the parts of the extend family I like are overseas (they are all on ma's side, I have no clue as to where his side are, he forbade ma from informing his brother and sister of his own death years ago), so the choice is duty or shutting out; and I am dutiful.
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