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It’s been a long time since I’ve had some me time. Or been in a place where I don’t have any pressing work to do. Today I decided to take (most of) the day off. I had to go to the hospital to get my bloods done ahead of my latest 6 month check up. I was in and out in 18 minutes so got free parking which is the kind of result that sets you up for a great day - it doesn’t matter if the bloods are bad and I am about to die. FREE PARKING. Take that Ian NHS.
I then went to the gym, though spent the first hour having a coffee and writing my blog and going through my emails, which I suppose is technically work. Just as I was about to go to the loo and head up to do some exercise there was a bit of a kerfuffle and the Mr Sands announcement came over the tannoy (doesn’t everyone know that that’s code for there being a fire? - at least change the name) and then we were told to evacuate. There didn’t seem to be a fire, but luckily I was fully clothed and right by the fire escape. We had to walk over to the congregation area which was quite a distance away across a huge car park. I felt this mass exodus was more likely to get someone run over or hurt than being in a fire. And amusingly the people who had been in the pool had to evacuate too and were waddling across the car park draped in those foil blankets that you get at the end of Marathons. It wasn’t clear if this was for real or just a test, but again, if the latter it seemed likely to cause somebody serious harm.
We were quickly allowed back in, so I guess there had been no fire. But what fun to be in an incident like this.
I did get up to the gym after this and finally seem to have some energy and strength returning, after a couple of months of feeling totally run down.
I then indulged myself by doing something that I might not have done in over a decade. I went to the cinema on my own in the afternoon. It felt almost wicked. I saw “The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent” which was very enjoyable and it was great to see Sharon Horgan being excellent too. I think the first half is better than the second, where it becomes less of a parody and more of a conventional Nicholas Cage film and I’d liked to have seen more of the imagination and craziness that the film promised. I liked the fact there was a drugs scene which didn’t involve the characters seeing weird shit, but just them bumbling around and behaving like idiots. And it’s a fun exploration of an actor’s choices and the phenomenon that is Nicholas Cage and is a grown up film which doesn’t involve super heroes. So I am behind it. I’d just like to have seen it push the envelope a bit further after a promising start.
Most important though, I got to spend the afternoon in a cinema and it was magic. If you don’t have kids (even if you think you never will) please enjoy the freedom you currently have. Don’t take it for granted. My life with kids is much better than my life before overall, but there were some bits of that pre-kid life that fucking rocked and which I didn’t even realise were amazing at the time. They should make you have kids as soon as you can have them so that you then appreciate your life once they’ve left home properly. Well done to all those of you who did it that way round.
Also available as a podcast for lunatics.
