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It was another late night last night, albeit one free from gigs. I have a relatively clear schedule next week with only one show booked in, but I’ll try and add to that next week. Ideally you want to gig three times a week to remain sharp, but at the same time you welcome a night in because your body feels this.
After another keenly-contested Star Wars Football game last night in which Death Star edged out visitors Empire by a goal to nil, a General Madine penalty (the only goal in four league fixtures this week), I found myself dozing off during last night’s Forest – Newcastle game.
In bed, I watched a couple of documentaries, first on the founding of Israel in 1948, and the events that led to its creation in the First World War, followed by a documentary on Rendlesham Forest. I’m not a big one for UFOs, but this one, for some reason overshadowed by Roswell when it’s far bigger, fascinates me, in part because I remember reading the early reports when it happened as a boy. In fact, the end of 1980 saw a couple of big UFO incidents, Rendlesham being preceded by the PC Alan Godfrey encounter in Todmorden, West Yorkshire (his theory that the ‘Adamski case’ is also UFO-related has always crept me out).
On the latest Howard Hughes Unexplained podcast (my favourite show bar none for the last 17 years – Talk Radio/Talk TV have wrecked his old radio show in the last year), he has a Rendlesham special in which it’s revealed that one Lieutenant at the military base was found bedraggled in the forest that night and had unloaded a round or two at a UFO that had been pursuing her. To cover things up, the rounds were logged back in at the base (as they always were) even though she had discharged her weapon. By logging rounds back in, no one would be asking questions about missing rounds. That information had never been released until this year, 42 years on. I probably haven’t explained it well but download episode 709 of Howard Hughes’ podcast to hear that story.
The plan this afternoon is to meet my friend for coffee and collect the laptop damaged last week. It’s had its last rights, the data has been saved and now, who knows what next? Maybe I’ll stick it in some glass cabinet so I never forget that it took 22 years for me to spill my first coffee in THE café.
While now rationing my appearances in my favourite place, who am I kidding, my spiritual home, owing to the scandalous price rises last week, I felt better for going there yesterday. I think if I can manage to get in there at the start and end of the week, that’ll do me, and in between, I’ll settle for the back-up café. A bit like stand-up’s ‘sandwich method’ where you stick your new material in the middle. Though last week I abandoned the sandwich method and did a brand new 10-spot in Croydon. Anyway, I digress.
As touched on yesterday, The Beard finally called me by my name this week. And he did it again yesterday. It took a couple of years. I can only see this came about because of the laptop. Was it this drama that saw him finally learn my name?
Were he and The Mullet discussing my laptop predicament and hearing The Mullet, who nailed my name down from Day One, repeatedly say my name finally burned it into his memory?
I’ve suspected for a while that maybe The Beard always knew my name but was always irked by my pronunciation of his. He has that distinctive Portuguese way of pronouncing the ‘R’ which is unique among southern European languages that I haven’t made an effort with because if I did, it would strike me as an affectation on my part, me not being Portuguese. Maybe though he expected it from me knowing of my Spanish heritage, so I was never given the pass that English customers got.
Still, he got there in the end.
I like that.
When you live alone, when you spend so much time on your own, living inside your head, I think life is about these small moments.
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