It was snowing in Buxton this morning, but it didn't look like it was going to settle, so I wasn't going to get stuck in Buxton. Which is a shame, cos that might have been quite a good title for a song. And if I had been stuck in Buxton I might had time to write "Stuck in Buxton". And get the line "the logic ties you up and rapes you" into it.
A slight panic this morning as my watch seemed to have gone missing. I was pretty sure I had had it in the room last night, but I looked all over the room and in my suit case and I couldn't find it. Had I left it in the dressing room, or on the table at breakfast or maybe in the car. It appeared not. I made phone calls and asked the hotel staff for help.
It was only when I was sitting in the bar passing some time writing my blog that I thought to look in my rucksack. When I had lost my car keys on tour a couple of years ago, this is where they had shown up. And once again, the rucksack was the place where my watch had ended up. It was inside my notebook. My mind is falling apart. I think I'm just tired - don't worry mum!
The drive to the Warwick Arts Centre was uneventful, apart from one incident in the last thirty minutes of the journey when I had to swerve a little bit to avoid a pair of pheasants who had walked into the road and were having a bit of a feathery face off. They seemed to be cross about something and about to have a rumble, but their anger with each other almost caused their demise because they were oblivious to the traffic coming towards them. I gave them room to fight and so did the two cars behind me, but after that I couldn't see what happened. There's a lesson there for us all. Sometimes if we are overcome by the red mist we put outselves in greater danger than we mean to.
But it was surreal to see pheasants going at each other. I had never seen them as an aggressive species. I suppose they are just fancy cocks.
Nice to get in front of a big crowd again tonight, with an almost full Warwick Arts Centre. I felt full of energy again, perhaps buoyed up by the fact that it was another early start and I was only 80 minutes from home.
Last year's drunk heckler was not back, though there was a woman quite keen to join in during the first half and I asked her if she'd had a sex change since last year. I did meet someone who gave me the name of last year's heckler though and who confirmed (as if I needed this confirmed) that he was a bit of a prick. I won't tell you his name though, although I suppose I could have actually found out where he lived and taken him up on last year's offer.
I didn't have time to fight like a pheasant though as I wanted to go home. It didn't feel like a week since my mammoth drive down from Hull. Time is flying by and I suppose I am now on the last third of the tour. It felt particularly good to have got this tricky little section over. There are still many more miles to go. I passed 120,000 miles in my car yesterday and think I might get to the magical 123,456 before this thing is over (that's in the lifetime of the car, rather than just this tour alone). But will I see it? I am disappointed to admit that I completely forgot about 118 118.
