I gave the flat a thorough clean this morning for the first time in just under a fortnight, before heading out for a lunchtime 10k. I suspect as the rain started to come down, I dragged out the cleaning a little longer than I needed to, but I eventually got into the park.
The run would’ve been even more monotonous had I not used it as an opportunity to rehearse two of my older ten spots with a view to tackling the newer set again this weekend from scratch. It’s incredible how certain lines get forgotten or the order of the material, even if they’ve been performed a hundred times, when you haven’t gigged for a week or performed that particular set in a while. Then I realised one or two new minor but significant additions had been forgotten from my early park rehearsals and corrected that.
Friday run1kerr action
The running has been invaluable when it comes to rehearsals over the last eight or nine months. The two things support each other. Right now, I just need the right gig to re-enthuse me. I’m enjoying writing my script. I miss doing the radio. I need a haircut. Just three random thoughts there for you to top off this paragraph.
Writing of radio, I ran into an old radio associate on the way into Brixton this afternoon, one of the nicest guys in the industry and a terrific producer to boot, one of the best in the country. Also, this guy WILL NEVER GO BALD. He has an incredible head of hair. We spoke about how we both feel there’s nothing to beat live radio. And that includes podcasting. I mentioned I am obsessive about committing to listening to my favourite radio shows live and indeed, I’ll shortly be listening to Lewis Goodall on LBC for the next three hours.
On the balding, I was watching the United v Sevilla tie last night and Sevilla’s captain had also had a hair transplant. These are commonplace now in football but still don’t look quite right and are quite easy to spot. A natural hairline is never straight but these transplants, now much more advanced than they were even a decade ago, are turning out guys with unnaturally perfect hairlines. Also, and I understand that after years of hair loss, the transplant guys just want to grow their hair out all the way, but they end up with very unnatural looking quiffs. BOUFFANTY. I think this is because the transplanted hair doesn’t grow with the grain, which is leading to this unusual look.
I eventually got into the back-up café just after 16:00HRS after a doomed attempt to buy a second air drier for the clothes, something I’ve been meaning to do since 2013 but suddenly there seemed to be an urgency about it today. Argos were out of driers and their cheapest model, £15, my weekly food bill when I’m pushing the boat out, had 807 poor reviews. It looks too flimsy and also a little too complex for someone like me, devoid of common sense, to put together. This meant I had to go into a couple of local shops, the kind which 30 years ago wouldn’t faze you. Back then, we were used to the personal touch, but these days, when almost everything is a little more distant, I find these shops a little awkward. You’re aware they’re family businesses. You feel the pressure to buy something but when the guy quoted me £25 for his second cheapest drier – and it was being displayed outside the shop on the filthy SW9 pavement (regardless of the plastic wrapping, that’s not coming in the flat) you got to walk away from it like a gig when a promoter’s messed you about on the evening.
I then bought some new running socks in a local sports shop, having given up on trying to wash the mud out of the current batch after the winter park run slog. As I finally found the budget Slazengers, I looked up to see a guy looking at me, like me, grizzly stubble and tired eyes. And I recognised him. An old neighbour from my earliest days. We played football together every day during the halcyon summer holidays of ’80 and then went to secondary school together. By then, the friendship was dead and even going to the same school never changed that. I still see his cousin about. She works at the local M&S but I don’t think she’d recognise me.
When I see people from the past, my thoughts often turn to how they might be dealing with middle age. You could be living the happiest life in the world but ultimately, none of us wants to get any older. Not after eighteen. I mean, when you’re in your teens, it’s all about trying to look eighteen so you can buy a porn mag (at least up until the late 90s before the dawn of online porn) or fags and alcohol, but after 18, did you really want to look older? When it comes to ageing, in our heads, we are all alone in finding a way to deal with it. I dread to think how little time I might have left to be able to continue playing Star Wars Football.
Meantime, Madeiran had shaved off the wispy Amish beard and gone for the standalone ‘tache and it looked brilliant. I told him so. Facial hair compliments are important. Nostril Flarer, standing behind the counter with his younger muscular colleague enjoyed my going into facial hair history – these days, the media wa*kers would call it a ‘deep dive’ to explain that for thirty years, the standalone ‘tache has, in the heterosexual community, been a facial hair pariah, but the youngsters are bringing it back in a way that my generation didn’t. I think we just gave up on it in the early nineties, at least down south.
16:53HRS
I finished my first decaf.
In other news, I’m really enjoying an anthology of 12 short Sherlock Holmes pastiche tales. I’m not a big one for short stories but this is one of the best pastiche/anthology books I’ve read in a long time and I’m looking forward to making further inroads into this tonight.
16:59HRS
I’m still waiting to place an order for my second coffee. Over at the counter, Upright is being held up by a local ‘character’, this very chatty guy, late twenties who by last summer I had twigged wasn’t the full ticket. He comes in here and chats to all the staff and customers as if he knows them. To be fair, he may know the staff now. He’s given them no choice in the matter and Double Denim, depending on his mood when he was here, would tolerate him. I see this guy doing this in every other shop pretty much on this high street, usually in some sportswear/leggings.
17:10HRS
Upright, making her way from the back of the back-up café, finally spotted my empty not-as-tall-as-a-tall-glass-should-be-tall-glass and asked: “Daniel, another?”
Knowing she was due to pass the table on her way back to the counter, I’d put my laptop to sleep the way they do in TV and film, you know, just closed the lid rather than shut it down properly, so she had clear sight of the empty glass.
Effective strategy.
17:27HRS
The second decaf finally arrives, Upright having again forgotten. Flarer had walked by two minutes ago and asked if I wanted another one, maybe thinking, “This guy’s getting too comfortable in here. We like him but he needs to order a coffee.”
Knowing him and Upright are married, I can hardly complain she’d forgotten my coffee again.
Interestingly, Flarer did use my name today when I came in. That’s the first time. I’d like to use his now. It won’t come across as over-familiar but he might think I’ve only used it today because he went first. And he’d be right. I might wait until tomorrow.
Café Soundscape 17:34HRS
17:37HRS
I’m shortly heading back to the flat. I’ve had a productive 1hr 45 in the back-up café working on the short film script. I’m tired. Hopefully I feel a bit more energised after the weekend. The dodgy knee feels okay considering I ran 30k this week and I’m very excited about tonight’s Star Wars Champions League Last 16 2nd leg fixture in which League Champions Hoth travel to a team whose name escapes me right now. You’ll have to forgive me. I tend to travel only with my work, sundry stationery and pharmaceuticals. There’s no space in the rucksack to carry the full fixture list for this season’s Star Wars Football campaign. It’s a huge game for Hoth though. A goalless draw at home has left them needing to score tonight and their only previous Champions League campaign two seasons ago was a disaster.
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