I was in two minds about coming to the back-up café this afternoon. Well, really, it’s the de facto first choice café these days following the price rise earlier this month in THE café – “let’s get that right” as the ever annoying Boxing Cockney correspondent Steve Bunce is fond of saying.
I have a lot of tidying up to do in the flat and a busted sash window to contend with, which with the window being new (albeit out of warranty) is a pain. I know how to fix it but I’m not taking apart some sash window to try and fix the weights on the pulleys which have come undone on one side. It’s a big job and I have no emotional attachment to the flat. I’ll have to live with this latest fault. Come the inevitable heat wave, this will be a problem. I’ll need to find a thick stick to keep the window wedged open. Being across from the park, I might be lucky enough to happen across something I can use this summer. Ideally, something that hasn’t been in a dog’s mouth. Hopefully, fingers crossed, I won’t have to worry about it and will be living somewhere else before that.
In part-clearing out a corner of the study (back to it tomorrow), I found an old picture, worth £60, given by an artist years ago, that I never got around to sticking up. Partly because I really don’t like art. I’m just not a visual guy. I’ve always been about words, not images. But more than that, I just don’t think I like the pretentiousness and exclusivity you often find comes with the art scene. Sharing this opinion with the artist who gave me that picture some years ago arguably hastened the end of that friendship. I’m also still a bit bitter perhaps after my favourite late night shop next to THE café made way for an art gallery. As poncy as SW8 is nowadays, it’s still not ready for an art gallery. The community needed the shop and not an art gallery. Do I need a pint of milk or do I want to see some art? Hmm. Let me think…
After a light lunch, I had a quick workout to the Tears For Fears Live in Knebworth 1990 set list that I’ve just discovered on YouTube. There was a DVD of their Knebworth performance that only covered three songs, performed largely in torrential rain and I had no idea they’d performed for nearly an hour. What’s memorable, or sad would be more accurate, is that was their final performance together before their acrimonious split. They wouldn’t speak for another eleven years. I’ve had close friendships like that. It was Curt Smith who walked, partly because he had trouble dealing with the fame side of being a musician ( as well as a divorce to contend with) and it cannot be overstated just how big the duo had been in the mid-80s. Roland Orzabal, by then the driving force behind the band’s ambitious new direction that had seen them take four years to release their third album, the brilliant ‘Seeds of Love’, was the stronger financially and had to take on the band’s huge debts after the album’s commercial flop.
The opening three tracks to the live performance, ‘Head Over Heels’. ‘Change’ and ‘Pale Shelter’ are outstanding. The latter two form part of a medley, which I’m always suspicious of. I normally hate it when bands do this. But this is the one instance where it works.
Through the nineties, I was obsessed with these guys, and in my radio series ‘The Letter’, I documented this obsession. Indeed, there was that night back in the terrible winter of 2010 when marooned in a hotel for six months (I thought writers were meant to do this), I lip-synced to the entire ‘Going to California’ concert for 90 minutes (I knew every word and gesture, all their respective guitar facials, both Orzabal’s and Smith’s) having watched the concert thousands of times since it first aired on ITV’s ‘Cue the Music’ one late Sunday night in November 1991. What confused me that night in the Pimlico hotel is I had no idea who I wanted to be more, Orzabal, the bigger creatively and with the more versatile voice, or the more affable Smith?
On the affable, I’m not sure I am affable. It’s something I’ve wrestled with since first happening upon the word back in ’92, indeed in an article used to describe Curt Smith. But I’d like to have been affable. That live concert re-enactment had left me quite tired that night. With no cooking facilities in the hotel, my diet for six months had largely consisted of takeaways, so fitness wise I was a lifetime away from my fitter, always-bitching-about-how-much-I-hate-running, mid-life incarnation.
Here on the high street, a quartet of preachers have set up outside the (empty) shop front next door with a camera mounted on a large tripod. Whatever garbage they’re spouting will no doubt be on YouTube by the evening.
Stepping inside the back-up café, I greet Muscular Madeiran, back at work today and holding court at a large table near the entrance. I suspect he knows them. As he leans on their table in a tight white top, I suspect he’s tensing those impressive arms. I note too he’s growing a beard. It’s a little wispy at the moment. If you stand at an angle, you can see right through it. That said, it’s superior to any beard I could grow at his age.
Upright, already cackling by the time I walk in, brings my coffee over. Just the SMALL talk with her helps my mood today. It’s the first words I’ve spoken all day.
Café Soundscape
I’m in a green polo top today, which always reminds me of the day Lopez died. What I’ve never been able to work out is whether I wear green from time to time because it reminds me of Lopez or because I remember thinking to myself, and always feeling guilty about it that Sunday back in June 2009 at St George’s Hospital where Lopez took his last breath, that in green, I might have finally found my colour. Which was sod’s law because I’m a low key guy and green, especially the brighter end, is not a colour for introverts. Fourteen years on, I still wonder why I wear it.
Maybe it’s both?
It threads me back to my great friend, while looking good. A rare shallow moment, maybe.
I had planned to clear out much of the study today, but a combination of growing irritated at hearing the sash window in the bedroom slamming back down every ten or so minutes, and the fact that sorting out the junk in the study is no easy job, meant that once my cousin messaged to say he’d be at my aunt’s later with his two youngest kids, I changed my plans.
After doing some work here, I’m jumping on the bus to Stockwell to see my aunt and uncle. We get to spend and savour some precious time with my uncle and hopefully the kids are able to distract him from his terribly sad predicament for a few hours. The youngest, just three, is quite the mischievous toddler, as all toddlers should be, so hopefully my uncle will be entertained.
It's 15:06hrs.
I stir my latte sinister-handed, as I have done in THE café for 22 years, though in here, it always seems to be right-sided stirring. I have no idea why I’ve switched to my favoured side today.
I again had to postpone the run today owing to the knee. In fact, it seems to be both knees playing up today. Maybe the left one is aching because I’ve been overcompensating on that side. The strengthening exercises I’ve found (I’m only 5 mins still into a 15-minute video just because these things are so boring I can never watch them in a single sitting) and which I’m doing, I’ve made sure to do with both knees but at the moment, there seems to be no improvement. A bit like the Instagram situation with these porn accounts. Seriously, what is it with that platform? I’m easily into double figures today blocking and reporting more accounts. I post pictures of coffees – in glasses, always in a glass – what do they think they’re going to get from my account? Why is my account attracting all these spammers?
15:10hrs.
I take my first sips of this coffee, made by Upright I think, and am not impressed. It’s a little too strong. In losing Double Denim, the temperamental, heavily-fragranced Italian, they’ve lost their most gifted coffee maker. Lately, Madeiran has impressed me. I noted he’d improved considerably in the few weeks I was away. Nostril Flare is a very good coffee maker, consistent, without blowing you away. Upright, if distracted and cackling all-too easily as a result of some unwitty remark made by a customer, can take her eye off the coffee-making ball.
There are several good hairstyles in here this afternoon I’d be happy to have, all on women. Which isn’t unusual. I did once have a social media clip from an appearance on Bibi Lynch’s much-missed, wonderfully madcap Bibi Does Soho radio show in which I ran through some of my favourite women’s hairstyles of all time that I’d have loved to have had for myself.
KD Lang’s ‘Constant Craving’ ’93 era hair remains my favourite. Magnificent. I once posted about that specific barnet on Instagram and KD Lang actually liked the post. Her vocals on that song were stunning, but her hair somehow matched the vocals. A unique achievement. Here I am, 5 years on from the KD Lang Instagram moment, and all I got is porn accounts spamming me. Sue Perkins is another with consistently great hairstyles I’ve envied. The comedian Rhona Cameron is one more who has over the years had brilliant hair. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that these first three are lesbians. When it comes to great hair, I honestly think it’s very difficult to outdo lesbians. I say that with utmost sincerity.
Bjork, also in ’93, on the cover of her debut solo album ‘Debut’ that summer was also memorable. The first heterosexual woman to make my list. Long hair, centre parting. I remember my sibling asking me that summer what I was planning on doing with my hair. They were back for a bit from uni and it was clear I was in-between hairstyles, as I often have been. I always seem to be on the cusp of a mullet.
I was still stuck at home, into my fourth year of sleeping on a fold-up bed in the front room. I showed my Sibling the Bjork cassette cover and told them that was the hairstyle I was after. I was taken aback by how they laughed. Thirty years on, I still don’t see what was so funny about it. By the time Tony Blair and New Labour had taken power in the late spring of ’97, I’d gone full Bjork.
A pensioner with long white William Hartnell hair has sat at the table in front of me, perusing a tabloid and right away, I’m ambushed by a tsunami of B.O. If he was reading a broadsheet, for some reason, I don’t think that would be happening.
I’m not sure it’s possible such a malodour could emanate from one guy and looking at the dishevelled tracksuited guy parked at the table ahead of Hartnell, I suspect I might be the victim of a Great Unwashed Medley. My super-sensitive nose is greatly troubled as I type.
The plan here, albeit this post is currently getting in the way, is to work a bit on the short film script which is undergoing a dramatic rewrite and which is likely to horrify my DOP who likes to keep things simple. If I can find a solution to one plot line, this thing comes together, but solving that is proving difficult.
When I’m firing on all creative cylinders, I love working on these problems but right now I’m a million miles away from being in that mindset. My focus is all over the place. On Monday, I’ll start rehearsing for next week’s gigs as well the big paid gigs coming up in the first week in April. I think limiting myself to one gig this week just gone was the right decision. This is proving a challenging time mentally and downing comedy tools for a few nights has been the right thing.
I picked up another gig in a ‘proper’ comedy club for September, another Kent gig. There’s a strong scene outside London. Here in the capital, we have too many nights of varying quality. It’s great to get these spots away from the open mic circuit. I’m confident about the future. I just hope that I can find the balance between the stand-up and my other writing because it concerns me how consuming gigging is.
There’s a young stand-up who messaged me the other day. I only met him a few times but I got a good feeling about him early on. A genuine guy who once gave me a hug before Christmas when I bloody well needed one that night. He walked away from a good job because it was affecting his mental health. He had a nice set that apart from having some very funny moments, always useful in a set, was actually quite poignant and resonated with me as he talked about the impact of gentrification on his life.
He’s now ‘retired’ from stand-up. He’s only just past 30, I think. It’s likely he’ll be back at some point and there’s nothing wrong with a U-turn now and again. But I admire his reasons for stepping back, at least for now, because he wasn’t finding it fun. It’s all-consuming and he was looking for a hobby, nothing more. It takes courage to accept something isn’t for you and I hope he finds something more in line with what his life needs.
As for me, the stand-up is work. Which I think is a healthy attitude. It means I prepare for it properly, like going into an office. There’ll be times when I’m not looking forward to it, but I’ll always do my utmost to be ready for the challenge of going on stage, because it is always a challenge.
15:58hrs
I’m waiting to order my second latte. Flare has wondered past my table at the back of the back-up café and not prompted me once for the second coffee. He’s not proactive.
Ever.
Just once I want the prompt from this guy.
Meantime, two diners arrive, the louder, a Cockney in a bright red roller neck under a caramel-coloured gilet he’s about ten years too old for, wonders aloud whether he should have the wild boar. I didn’t even know they offered wild boar here. Either way, I find myself reflecting that this isn’t a guy who’s been affected by the cost of living crisis.
“I never used to like Quail,” says Wild Boar. “I always thought it tasted a bit like liver.”
I have no way of verifying this. I had Quail once. In 2007. I don’t think I enjoyed it. 2004-’08, these were my Game years when I became very ambitious with my food owing to a close friendship forged with a film maker from Carlisle. We were soul mates. Enjoying the same humour, the same music. I was even shopping for clothes in French Connection, just because of him. These were my final drinking years though I was never a big drinker so going teetotal two days into 2011 was never a problem for me.
We’d hole ourselves up on a Sunday in a pub in Hemel Hempstead called, I think, ‘The Dick Turpin’, have multiple courses, desserts, cider and then our girlfriends at the time, neither of whom were big on food but boy could the pair of them drink, would pick us up and take us home.
Wild Boar has yet to make a decision on his meat. It would be great if he did so I could place my second coffee order in. No staff member is going to be in a hurry to get my meagre order in when there’s a customer potentially ordering the Wild Boar like he’s just walked off the pages of an Asterix book.
By the way, if you’re enjoying this post, perhaps you’d be kind enough to share the link to it on whatever social media you use as I look to grow this page. I really don’t want to end up with another little-followed podcast on my hands. I think this Substack deserves to be big. Obviously, as with all things, I might be deluded.
I don’t think I am though.
16:05hrs.
Flare again walks past my table. I call out behind him to get his attention for the second coffee.
I fail.
He’s now behind the counter with three other members of the team and I here I am, latte-less.
Of the quartet behind the bar, I’d rather not be served by Muscular Madeiran just because I’d feel under pressure to expand any SMALL talk. He’s a nice guy. We’ve had some decent exchanges but this really today is a flash visit before I head to see my uncle shortly.
The young female member of staff, who I think is Romanian but speaks fluent Italian, I don’t think she has any particular interest in engaging with any guy over 25, so again, I’d rather not be served by her.
16:08 hrs.
Upright, walking towards the kitchen, sees my glass, and asks “Another coffee?”
F***ing ALLELUJAH.
To my right, two o’ clock, a quartet, two young couples, are chatting away, enjoying life. One of the girls, whose long, centre-parted hair reminds me of my ’97 Bjork look, shows her phone to her boyfriend. “Look how long my lashes are.”
By the law of averages (I have no evidence to back this up), one of these couples will fall by the wayside. Will the friendships survive the fall? Based on my own experience, I’ve lost several friends that were inextricably linked to past relationships. Sometimes you just have to have the clean break and friendships have to be sacrificed.
Don’t forget, the clocks go forward tonight. I’ll do mine when I get back home.
Do I need to end this post on such a below-par adminny note?
16:16hrs.
The young waitress brings over the second latte. There’s zero interest in either of us crossing the generational divide and dialoguing. As she places my latte on the table, I lose track of how much ink she has on her right arm. She’s probably looking at my ink free skin, my salt and pepper hair thinking, “Yeah, I can always find myself a toy boy once I hit forty.”
The colouring on this second latte, without even tasting it, tells me it’s superior to the first. As I stir it, right-handed this time, even though I’ve switched the glass over to my left, I tell myself this is what a latte should look like.
I’ll leave the last word to Wild Boar.
Upright collects his empty plate and asks how the wild boar was.
He smiles. “That c*** went down a treat.”
There’s a new word for Upright’s already impressive grasp of the English language.
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