5666/18686
Bedford tonight and I had not filled the 600 seater venue so they moved me to a room with a 180 capacity that I didn’t fill either. But I had well over 100 in and that’s all that counts.
I was feeling knackered all day, hoping my sore throat was from yesterday’s inability to vomit, rather than because I had glandular fever caught from my tour manager. I set off for Bedford early, couldn’t really find where I was meant to go and parked up in a small underground car park with loads of pillars in it. I managed to very lightly brush the side of the car against a pillar, transferring paint from the post on to passenger door. I only ever seem to prang my car when travelling at 1 mph. And nearly always on the rear passenger door. This is like my driving Achilles heel. It’s not that bad. And today my car just looks like it’s been scribbled on by an excited toddler. So at least it now matches my house.
Bedford shopping centre in the sunshine was a mildly oppressive place to be and nowhere seemed to have any credit card facilities working, which made me wonder if the rest of the world had been destroyed and like a cockroach Bedford had survived. When it came to trying to get some dinner I wandered aimlessly around for about 30 minutes. Places were either closing or not yet open. Costa had turned off their sandwich oven early due to lack of custom. I ended up in Burger King. This was not the best way to ensure no repetition of yesterday’s sweaty illness.
In the hour before the gig I managed to write about 10 emergency questions. For some reason these are easier to do at night.There are around 50 to go. But I am very pleased with what I’ve done.
As it turned out I plenty of energy for the gig and though the audience took a while to warm up in a room that reminded me of the chapel at the end of the Graduate, it turned out to be an OK gig. It was all a lot easier than last night, somehow.
Sunday’s show in Warwick Arts Centre has sold out, so that will be a nice way to put this tour to bed. I don’t think I could have carried on too much longer. I had hoped that the end of the tour would more or less signal the end of work for the summer, but there’s still a bit more to do on the book and the sitcom (which keeps getting bumped back due to actor availability which makes me wonder if it was never intended to be recorded this year, but they just wanted to make sure I wrote it).
