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We have mourned for the greatest loss of 2022, but it is time to move on. Though the nation will probably never fully recover from the loss of our cat, Smithers, we still have to live our lives. And we’re getting two new cats next week. They can never replace Smithers of course. Actually they totally can. Cats are all basically the same and in all likelihood these two will be better and less weird than him. I am delighted that Smithers died.
This morning we went out to buy new cat stuff this morning, the kids very excited about it all, and came home with all manner of scratching posts, baskets and multi-level climbing frames. This is the first time the kids have been old enough to appreciate a new pet and they are naming the cats too. There’s a ginger one and a tabby one. Phoebe wants to call the ginger one “Tabby” and I think Ernie has settled on “Chocolate” for the not-particularly chocolatey tabby one. So that will be enjoyably confusing.
That was a fun family morning out, but then I had to drive down to South London for an afternoon delight RHLSTP at the Bedford in Balham with Ria Lina. If I ever needed to feel crushed by the strata of time, it’s pretty much 20 years since I moved out of Balham, having lived in Clapham or Balham for a decade. The Bedford is home of the Balham Banana, probably the best stand up venue in London and which I first played back in 1990. I didn’t have many good gigs in those days, but I remember closing the upstairs room at the Banana and doing so well that I actually got an encore. And I barely had any more material than the 20 minutes I’d done. I’m not sure I’ve ever had an encore again. Bob Mills came up to me afterwards and said (jokingly) “Never do better than me again.” And I never did.
On stage I also remembered that it had been in this room that I’d come to playwright Terry Johnson’s birthday party and there had been a karaoke machine and Peter Baynham bet me £100 that I wouldn’t do Bohemian Rhapsody. I did it and it was terrible - it’s a very hard song to do - and Peter never paid up. I remember Alison Steadman was there, but I have never reminded her of the incident.
Anyway as weird as it was doing a RHLSTP in the afternoon, the hour or so whizzed by and Ria was an excellent guest. I am delighted to see her doing so well after many years in the business. Experience is always best and comics like her and Chris McCausland have more than earned this stripes. Ria was then heading off to do two Just a Minutes before heading to Salford to appear on University Challenge (presumably tomorrow), so she’s very much in demand.
I was back home in time to help put the kids to bed. The kids insisted I read them Julia Donaldson’s The Baddies for the second night in a row. I asked if they wanted me to do the voices again and they enthusiastically said they would, which is about the greatest crowd reaction I’ve had from them. I got the witch and the troll sounding a bit the same tonight, but the ghost was excellent. I can’t compete with her and her family performing the books (as you may remember I saw in Edinburgh), but lovely to get this affirmation both for the book and for me as a story teller.
