Aside from my yearly migration to Edinburgh I have not moved house since 2003. And even though we are by no means moving all our worldly goods this time round, it's still been a major military exercise. Today we got most of our stuff out to Harpenden in a couple of jaunts up the M1 and I got to see my new home (for 5 months) for the first time. It's quite small but it's homely and I think we'll be happy enough there. We'll practically be living in the countryside (though of course, for most of the time I will be on tour), but it will also be our first marital home. It's thus the building in which I will lose my virginity, which is an exciting thought. (my mum read this, folks)
I certainly didn't need to go the gym today, as lugging boxes up and downstairs all day long kept me in super shape - I needed to bring enough boxes of programmes to last me til the end of the tour, which accounted for pretty much one whole car load. I also worked out why I have had an odd sharp pain in my shin on and off over the last few weeks. I couldn't remember having hit myself on anything and yet this bruise like ache would come and go, of course making me suspect I had shin cancer. But today as I carried the price board for my merch up the stairs to the flat, one of the retractable legs hit my bang on the shin. It hurt, but it's one of those things that you can do to yourself without really registering. But this time, for the first time apparently I noticed it at the time and managed to connect it to the odd pain in my shin. I hadn't got shin cancer at all - unless hitting yourself repeatedly in the shin with a prong can give you cancer. Oh shit.
Remarkably, in spite of this being a full on day starting at 10am and ending at 12 midnight with little to no rest time, I managed to fit in a final frame of Me1 vs Me2 snooker before the snooker hall that is my basement gets dismantled. My fiancee was out buying us some Nandos for lunch and the Mes took their chance, though the frame is somewhat ruined when my girlfriend returns with the spicy chicken and all the players and commentators seem to lose focus in the game and start to worry about their chips going cold. You won't hear this one for a bit though, as it's one in the bank, so to speak. Frame 11 will be out tomorrow and Frame 12 the Monday after, so you won't get to hear the Nandos podcast until March. I don't know if there will be any more until the house is finished, but when I mentioned to my fiancee how much I was looking forward to playing snooker in this new space, she looked at me a bit askew and commented that she didn't think the snooker table would look right in this lovely new space, so Me2's fears about the pussy whipping of Me1 might come to bear.
However, after we'd carried the snooker table up two flights of stairs and realised how heavy it was I think we'll probably be bringing it back down rather than taking it even further up the house. Me1 vs Me2 snooker can not die.
The second run out to Hertfordshire was late and we weren't in the flat til 10, but we're not staying there yet - my three days off from the tour are packed with moving, working on the second series of Fist of Fun and then getting wedding stuff sorted and having my car fixed. Hopefully I will be out there again on Tuesday night or Wednesday morning, before zooming off for the next leg of the tour. I quite like being this busy, providing I don't actually collapse with exhaustion and things should settle down once we're in the new place for real.
It will be interesting to see how life out of the city will compare with life in. Will we be itching to get into our new home or glad to be out of the rat race? Will we ever return? I hope so or I will be wasting a lot of money on my house!
