We left our home for five nights, the Ibis Hotel in Leeds, this morning. I was sad to have to say goodbye to my windsurfer who has become my best friend and also my lover whilst I have been here. He just carried on windsurfing and didn't even seem to flinch, but maybe that's how he copes with goodbyes.
I decided to leave the Ferrero Rocher I had been given at Wolverhampton for the woman who had been cleaning my room. It felt nice to make this kind of gesture as I am sure most customers at the Ibis don't tip the staff. So I hoped it would make her happy, as well as compensate for the difficult and uncomfortable cleaning she had had to do on the windsurfer picture.
Psychologically it felt like we were now close to the end of this run, whilst yesterday it had somehow seemed endless and with traveling to fill up the middle part of the day, things passed by more quickly.
I was back in Chorley Little Theatre tonight,
a venue I had very much enjoyed playing on the last tour even if
the town itself smells of smegma. It's odd reading back over those entries and remembering that it was only last year that I had a toothbrush moustache. None of that seems like it really happened now. It was such an unsettling experience I have wiped it all from my memory, just like the windsurfer has wiped away the memories of how we passed thos long lonely nights in Leeds.
I popped back into "Parmesan and Peppers", the restaurant that I missed out on the Happy Hour deal at last year. The staff were young and a touch grumpy perhaps. They were busy again and no doubt concentrating on their jobs, but there was apparently no time for a welcoming smile. I didn't mind - once again I just wanted my food as quickly as possible. But later in a show where there was a lot of messing about from both me and the audience I would talk about the experience and a new name for the eaterie popped into my mind, "Parmesan and Petulance". The crowd laughed in a way that made me think I wasn't alone in noticing this, but also that from now on the place would be rechristened by the locals. It's still a great place to eat if you like eating hearty and tasty Italian food, served to you by sullen teenagers. And luckily I do like that. Second only to committing depraved acts with two dimensional windsurfers.
After a few tougher gigs with smaller audiences it was great to be back in a medium-sized and full theatre, with an enthusiastic crowd. They were really up for a good night out - some of them coming in with three drinks that Reliable Pete assumed were to share with their friends, until he saw they were all doing that - and during the 55 minute first half a good 20 or 30 people had to have a toilet break.
After I had read my childhood stories a woman in the audience shouted out (perhaps in the manner of a Tellytubby), "Again", which led to a fun running joke as well as a long discussion about the nature of theatre. It was another bizarre and unlikely heckle, difficult to deal with as it was essentially positive, impossible to be prepared for, but therefore lots of fun to deal with. I found tonight I was ad-libbing easily and with fluidity. I told her she'd have to come to Doncaster tomorrow to see the show if she wanted repeats as it was impractical to just do all the bits in the show over and over again, but then I decried the vagueries of a tour which would take me back to Yorkshire tomorrow, but then the next day, back very close to where I was today, to Bolton.
The heckles I got tonight were very good natured and I dealt with them in the spirit that they were intended. Once again it was terrific to be in this theatre, run with real enthusiasm and love by the people in charge and clearly much appreciated by the locals.
A High Anglican churchman had come to the show (in his dog collar) to review the show. I met him afterwards and we had our photo taken together during whichhe genuinely asked me to kiss his ring. I think he enjoyed the show, if not all of the content, but like most Christians who bother to come and actually see the show he admired its research, its balanced and somewhat Christian conclusion, the fact I was collecting for SCOPE and the fact that the issues were at least being discussed. I will be interested to see what he writes about it, but he seemed like a fun and game fellow.
Just two more gigs til home now.
