The smell of Fall.

So I'm just back from Edinburgh.
I say 'just'; it's been over two weeks, but it's taken all of that time to re-adjust to Beccles Town.
For a start, the streets of my rural abode aren't littered with A5 paper-flyers, themselves littered with quotes & reasons as to why I should 'not miss' a particular show.
If Beccles needed to advertise in this way, it would probably put up one hoarding saying "It's a bit shit, but pop-in if you're free?"
This will be the title of my next show.

The other thing that sets Suffolk apart from Scotland's capital city, is the smell.
At this time of year we are constantly awakening to a fug that can only be described as 'shitty'.
As a child, my parents would chastise me for wrinkling my nose, and follow this up with "It's only a bit of muck!"
For the past few years however, 'a bit of muck' has begun to smell like human faeces.
I'm reliably told that it is chicken-shit, lovingly matured by the local poultry 'manufacturers' a la Mr.Matthews, but I'm also reliably told (by another source) that the local water companies sell-on our own human waste, which is then degraded to a rich-smelling manure, for use in agro-chemical spreading.
It's not pleasant.
My wife says it smells like blood & bone, or kitten-kibble, and this makes me think it isn't in anyway similar to the grassy horse-poo we use on the allotment!

Anyway; today the air is free of smells.
It's blustery, sunny & cool, and there's a distinct sense that a new seasonal-chapter is about to open.
I love autumn.
I love it so much, I don't mind referring to it as 'Fall'.
For clean-freaks like me, September is a time to start emptying those slug-pubs, turning the compost-heap, harvesting the last corn-cobs, tomatoes & elderberries, chopping up firewood and tidying up the land, as we head into the ever-darkening months of winter.
I love days like these.

And as I leap from my bed and put on my well-worn gardening clothes, I catch my foot in my braces, stumble towards a sleeping kitten, narrowly miss squashing her, by concocting a sort-of Highland Fling-meets-Diversity dance-step, trip over three pairs of jodhpurs, two pairs of gaiters, a riding helmet and crop, and land with an almighty thump, somewhere between salvation & hospitalisation.

I'm ok.
A bit bruised & broken.
Just totally fucked for another day.

Autumnal smell or no smell, the garden & allotment can wait for a bit.
There's only so much you can do with elderberries anyway.......

We've grouted the bathroom; now for the renaissance.....

I'm off to Edinburgh tomorrow.
5 years ago, after some quality broadsheet write-ups & a BBC Edinburgh Review TV appearance, I said that I'd never go again.
Times change.
Needs must.

There's nothing of importance in this blog.
I'm still not quite sure of the efficacy of all the communication-tools available to me.
I was about to change my Facebook status to "I'm off to Edinburgh tomorrow", when I thought to myself, I can Tweet that.
I fired-up the behemoth, and as I waited for the hourglass to leave the screen, and the dingly-dong Window's signature tune to fade into kettle & toaster buzz, I thought; Wouldn't this be easier by cell-phone?
(I still call them cell-phones. They're not properly connected.
To anything.)
And then Snooze pointed out that there were applications that would automatically do this for me.
And I felt quite unimportant.
So I blogged instead.
It's a lot more personal this way.
I only have 14 'Followers'.
You.
So this way, I feel like I'm addressing a crowd.
A small crowd.
There's nothing of importance in this blog.
But the BBC Edinburgh Review programme informed us this week, that the average audience at Fringe shows, was 5 people.

Edinburgh's Interior Decor

I shit you not, it's happening!
It's only fuckin' happening!

I'm doing a show. Edinburgh Fringe. In August.
It's with John Osborne (Radio Head, What If Men Burst In Wearing Balaclavas? The Newsagent's Window) and Patrick Lappin (used to live in that pub on Ber St.), and I can't really believe it's all happening.

Paddy (as I like to call him) is a rock.
No. He's more than that. He's the sexy bit. The charmer. The rogue.
He can make you wet your knickers in fear.
But he's solid.
A grafter.
Extremely reliable and very hard-wearing.
He's a wall.
A sexy wall.
He's a bathroom wall.

Jozzers (as I like to call him) is pretty.
You look & listen to him, and your heart melts & your head goes a bit fuzzy.
He's a beautiful man.
But he's very straight-edged.
(And I don't mean in a tee-total,gay,abstainer way)
He's got great lines. Straight,dependable,necessary lines.
And he shines. And I know all about shining.
non luceo uro ;-)
For an OCD'er like me, he's my perfect accompaniment to Paddy.
Paddy's wall.
He's a ceramic tile.
A bathroom ceramic tile.

And me?
I'm the grout.

It's happening!
It's only fuckin' happening!


THE 100 GREATEST SWISS BEEKEEPERS. EVER!
'Three Sisters' - Room With A View (Opposite Underbelly)
August 20th-30th

The Sun Always Shines Ennui

You’ve checked the weather for the day ahead.
You always do.
Your friends think it’s a little idiosyncratic, but they always rely on you for suitcase-packing advice, just before the annual dearth of shit, drugs and mud (a.k.a. Festival-Time).
You watch ‘Weather For The Week Ahead’ on Countryfile religiously.
You always do.
It’s the only thing you do religiously on a Sunday, since rejecting 11 O’clock mass in your twenties.
It’s well documented that you don’t trust BT Yahoo, and this extends to anything other than the BBC Weather website, the ‘Weather For The Week Ahead’ and your natural ability to forecast changes in barometric pressure.
Arthritis can be a cruel yet precise master.
Your wife wakes you at 7am and tells you it’s going to be a ‘lovely day’.
You have already planned a better day, one that involves pyjamas, a typewriter and a jar of Poundstretcher coffee (that tastes a little bit like legal highs).
A ‘lovely day’ suggests the need to do something altogether different.
To water the garden, to do at least two clothes-washes, to resurrect the washing-line that was holding up both the defunct satellite dish and the wonky guttering, and to fix the wife’s bike; all before lunchtime, when the rabbits will require their bi-annual vaccinations, and the kitten will need tutoring on how to catch field-mice.
A better day involves rain.
You have planned a better day, safe in the knowledge that Countryfile said it would be damp & showery over the Broads.
This is despite what Chris Evans said this morning, and contrary to the FiveLive reports from all over Lower England, that the sun is shining, and it’s going to be a very lovely day.
The lady in the vets said it was an absolutely gorgeous today.
The man with the dog-eared cat agreed.
Victoria Derbyshire asked the nation for a response to the question “What will YOU be doing today, officially the first day of summer?”
You had planned to stay in and write, but the nation is conspiring against you.
You turn off the radio. The kitten and the rabbits are asleep.
The sunshine pours through your half-opened eyelids, and you decide to water the garden.
A superficial watering. The bits that really need it.
A one-can watering (It makes sense to be sure).
By 10-30am, you have emptied the washing-machine of a ‘mid-week essential’ load.
You toy with the idea of cleaning the cushion-covers & hand-towels, but opt for the bedsheets.
You know it’s going to rain.
You always do.
It was on ‘Weather For The Week Ahead’.
You make a coffee. It tastes a bit like rain. You feel smug.
The washing-machine spins as you jot down loose thoughts.
The ideas flow as the coffee is drained.
The kitten thinks that this might be the time to practice ninja.
And the rabbits sidle to a warm sheltered spot, twixt the billowing sheets and the watering-can.
You absorb the dappled sunlight like a soporific sponge.
And within what seems like seconds, it starts to piss cats & dogs.
And as you flick the switch to 'Heating Constant' amidst the fug and funk of fabric-conditioned warmth, you know (and you always do) that today has just got a little bit better………

SKY - You either get it; or you hate it

Tonight we are to be faced with another Prime Ministerial TV Debate, the second of three I think. I nearly watched all of the last one, but with no advert/piss break, I left the room, lost interest and subsequently switched channels for the more entertaining 'Outnumbered'. Tonight's debate takes place on a channel that is quite alien to me. I watch Sky in pubs, often because it's a cricket or footy match I'm interested in, but sadly too often, because it's all-pervading nature is a seemingly necessary prerequisite, now that smoking has been banned. I don't like Murdoch. I'm anxious about rampant commercialism. But for the past hour I have sat through Sky News' 'Debate Day' coverage, having realised I 'owned' the channel as part of my Freeview package, and wanted to get a feel for the standard of presentation I would receive this evening. What a pile of shite! Same tagline repeated, refreshed, repeated and diluted, until the only thing you can be sure of, in this cultural hinterland, is that the break-bumper sponsors (in this case, Sky themselves!) will keep you informed that very little news is happening, and they've got it all for you - LIVE! A banner repeatedly tells me that Marmite are pissed off with the BNP, whilst interviews with so-called political analysts & journos, go something like this; - So who will win tonight's debate? - Well. You know, it's a hard one to call, y'know. I think that Clegg gave a very real account of himself last time, y'know, but we mustn't forget y'know, that there are two other participants, you know? It really could go either way. - Thanks Jayne. Only 6 hours to go. Can Clegg win? Can Mr.Brown fight back? So many questions...... (Cut to simultaneous ads for Sky Box Office, Sky Sports and Sky 1. "If you're watching Sky News, you probably don't have these!") I won't be watching tonight. It's not that I'm not interested, it's just that I guess I'm a TV snob. I grew up with only 3 channels, and one of those was a testcard for most of the day. Sky TV is TV for TV's sake. It's frighteningly insipid, lacking in interest, dull, diluted & downright shoddy. So why does it offend me so much? I guess with age, comes a little obdurate cynicism; but fortunately for all of us, we still have choice. Love it or hate it, no-one's forced to subscribe. I shall be watching 'Outnumbered'.

Potatoes, tomatoes & volcanoes

It occurred to me the other evening that the last time Eyjafjallajoekull (or Joe Kull as I like to call her) erupted, we weren't only pre-aviation, but pre-industrial revolution. Meteorology was in its infancy and Iceland did not have a single bank. I wondered if the resulting ash-cloud had little, if any, effect on our good nation in the early part of the nineteenth century, and the results I discovered were interesting. Both Joe Kull & the Indonesian volcano Tambora erupted in the early 1800s, creating an agricultural nightmare for damp or wet island nations, such as Ireland. Fungus proliferated in these climes, and the resulting blight led to the Irish Potato Famine of the 1840s. This in turn led to the Irish diaspora of the middle nineteenth century, and the migration of many Irish families such as the Geldofs,the Nortons, the McKenzies & the Lappins. I wouldn't normally condone the use of pesticides on allotments, but I appeal to all gardeners this summer; please keep an eye on your plum tomatoes.

Blogging's not for me

I like writing.
I always have.
Blogging seems to be a way of sharing your writing with others, without incurring the financial wrath of the Royal Mail.

But it's not for me.

I've been sitting at my PC for nearly three hours now.
I'm trying to post a blog that I wrote on my dysfunctional laptop-thing last week.
I copied & pasted it (they taught me that at City College) and I clicked on the button that said "Publish Now'.
But it wouldn't publish.
It said I had a funny HTML or something, which I took a little personally, as I often do with personal criticism (they taught me that at boarding school)
It said my HTML thing didn't do 'Meta'.

Now I know what 'meta' means (they taught me that at UEA).
But I fail to see what is so meta about my blog post.
It's about fliers on my kitchen wall, and titting-up other poets.
The classical Greek sense of meta, nor the esoteric English language sense, have any connection with my story, so I can only assume that it has something to do with HTML, of which I know nothing.

I do assumption well (they taught me that at altar-boy practice).

If anyone could inform me of what HTML is, I would be forever grateful.
I do hope I haven't overstepped the literary mark with my meta?