Finally, after it's been sitting in my attic for two months, we managed to connect up the new podcast studio to record
Collings and Herrin Podcast 51. It didn't look like it was going to work and took Andrew a lot of beavering away before the microphone finally started registering on his computer, but he did it in the end, let the baby Jesus bless him.
Opinion seems divided on whether it's made any difference at all to the sound quality and of course the sound Nazis who have such sensitive ears that they can hear a pin being dropped in Notting Hill are now complaining that it's not in stereo and that we're not using pop shields and that my attic isn't sound proofed. These people are never satisfied. I feel sorry for them. I thought my hearing was a bit sensitive to peripheral noise and people chewing too loudly or (as Collings does ever week) rubbing his fingers repeatedly against newspaper, yet the podcast has always sounded OK to me. So how these people get by on a day to day basis without murdering everyone they come across, I don't know.
I can't tell much of a difference from the little bit I've heard, but then it sounded fine to me beforehand.
The downside of the Podcast studio was that it took all afternoon to upload the thing to the website (this is a secret location, where it is located by our orange juice guzzling internet monkey who then does whatever he does to it in order for it to go into your ears). It had been made into a WAV file whatever that is, which is clearly much too big, but after a couple of hours of waiting around and bickering we managed to find some software that would convert it to an MP3. Even then it took another forty minutes to be sent off. I had Collings in my house for about five hours, eating his stupid rice salad which he'd brought in a tupperware container and rubbing his fingers against newspaper and wittering on in his Mr Bean voice, with oatmilk dribbling down his chin. It was a more effective Hell than anything Satan could have dreamt up and suggest that if God or Allah or whoever is up there wants to punish me for all eternity, then making me wait in my attic with Collings for a podcast that never uploads would probably be the greatest torment that could befall me.
But I was just tired and fractious and frustrated with myself for not having got any work done on my book again. And the podcast had been quite an interesting one, if rather more serious than usual for the first half an hour as we discussed free speech and Carol Thatcher.
We had also discussed why Dime bars are now called Daim bars. Usually when a confection changes name there is a big publicity generating fuss about it, but this alteration seemed to happen surreptitiously. Of course listeners almost immediately let me know that it's because that's what they are called in Sweden (where the bar originates) and they clearly made the decision to call them that all over the world - saving themselves having to print up different labels - lazy Swedes. I'd like them to go back to being called proper Dime bars again, and like Opal Fruits and Marathons will continue to use that name whether they see sense or not.
Finally Collings left my house, but there was no time to do anything useful by this late hour, so decided to walk to the theatre again. I got as far as Lancaster Gate this time (eating another Dime bar on the way) before feeling a bit tired and getting the tube. I was meeting up before the show with a man from
Equity, the actors' union trying to persuade me to take up my lapsed membership. In the old days one had to be an Equity member to get TV or radio work, but I had stopped paying my subs when the closed shop ended, largely due to various incidents which made me lose respect for my union - most notably when the Equity rep from Bristol insisted we had to have an Equity member act on our open mike spot for now forgotten touring radio show "The End of the Roadshow." That would have been fine if he hadn't then proposed himself as the act that would be on the show, making the whole thing seem rather self-serving. In the end when he watched the rehearsal and realised that his (in all probability rather more old-fashioned and traditional) act would not work in this new and trendy show he pulled out and didn't insist on another member taking his place.
So I was happy not to pay them any subscription money once I no longer had to, but now, as an older and perhaps wiser man I think it might be a good thing to be part of a union again. Maybe I can work myself up and become a representative and then insist that I be given work on radio shows. Might be my only shot at getting work in my old age. So I think I will rejoin. The guy I talked to was passionate, but not too pushy. I bought him an orange juice. This, seemingly, is the way I repay everyone who does me a service.
The show was fine, though not as good as last night, and I was conscious that I was going too fast at the beginning, but didn't seem to be able to slow down. I had a different tech and there had been another screw up with the intro tape coming in at the wrong point and I had had to frantically get on the headphones and try and work out how to talk to the operator to tell them to start again. It's amazing how much these minor crises can affect the performance, but I like to be calm and collected when I go on and not panicking.
But it settled down and was a solid show and had a nice chat with some audience members afterwards. One of them looked familiar and greeted me saying, "I used to work on your show." For a moment I couldn't place him. "Really?" I asked.
"Yeah, Fist of Fun.... I'm Nick."
It all came back to me. "Polystyrene Nick!" I exclaimed with wonder. He had been the gaffer on the show, one of those titles like Best Boy that amuse and confound the public (and to be honest, me as well). But his main job, so it seemed to me, was to hold the big sheet of polystyrene which balances out the lighting or reflects light to the right place - or something. I have always had a big problem with the sound polystyrene makes when scraped against anything else and so this is why he got his nickname from me, but he was also quite a character, always cheerful and joking and thus stuck in the memory - though we were blessed with a very supportive and friendly crew for that show, which is not always the case.
Polystyrene Nick had not changed too much and was still his cheeky old self, though he's moved on from the gaffering and polystyrene holding to be the big cheese (that isn't the official name, but can't remember what you call the head of lighting - you'd think the gaffer was the head, but he's just the polystyrene holder). It was great to see this face from the past and have a drink with him and his wife. Especially seeing that nearly everyone else who came up to talk to me asked if there was going to be a DVD of Fist of Fun. Nice for him to see that people still remembered the show fondly. And most of that was surely down to the way he had held that polystyrene. I left the theatre with a smile on my face. It's good to catch up with old friends.
