Day 222: Venomous?

These are venomous, apparently

I found a penny at the bottom of an escalator. Pointless glee. There was nobody else near. I had time to scoop it without causing an escalator pile-up.


Today, another first. In a cubicle in the ladies' toilet of a medical centre with a conference facility, on the sanitary towel disposal unit, still showing the remains of its contents, an empty burger box. Who? Who would do that? Oh, I haven't quite finished... I'll just take it in. What? Still, it pleased me greatly, that. Very much so. 

Never do cocaine

I swam with Emily Cuphead. It was a blissful, gentle morning. 20 degrees, the water itself. Slightly colder in the air, but not enough to make a steam. Achy bones today. Not sure why.


I had the pleasure of Jerry Lindop again today, making faces and committing foolish acts behind the sets before I go on, doing spoof voiceovers, charming the delegates and the trainers and making everyone laugh. Loving his work.


I didn't lose my phone. A small thankful thing, not losing that, but I thought I had, see. I thought I'd left it at the pond. I hadn't. But it could have so easily been so. I'd left it on the windowsill by the front door, before I left the house. Once again, the gratification of something annoying not being true is not to be underestimated.

OOOH... scared.

Tomorrow, I must buy a suit jacket, smart pants and another smart shirt. From charity shops. Exciting.

Day 221: This Kind of Day

Kind of content. Honest. This is good.

Yoop. Another sweet and pleasing day. Oh, that gentle water, cold only just at first and then silky-warm and blissful. We gathered elderflowers today, Ruth and I. We ate brownies and bananas on a bench. We met Ruby, a gumptious Ridgeback, Rottweiler, Staffy cross. Small and eager. Ridged. On her back. She had a massive, tat-clad owner who was sweet as a granny. Good times.


Ooh, ooh, ooh and how nice is it that I should post a desire to find a place to live for August and within seconds, I have a lovely answer which might well work perfectly, and another offer too. Brilliant.


I spent a pleasant afternoon and finished with a smile. I'm going to sleep now, but not until those shirts are ironed. 


See you at 7.15, Cuphead.

Day 220: Fuck Yeah

Today = fuck yeah!

I love Esther Lilley, now Mrs Harvey. Today, I got to speak to her. We embrace all things. We must. I love Rob Grundel,  player, improviser, entrepreneur, brainbox. Today I got to catch up with him. Ideas are afoot. I love Brent and Marc, Montreal improvisers and all-round good guys. Today, I got to watch them play their improvised Action Movie. They rocked. I love Ruth, artist, cousin, musician, impressive woman. Tomorrow, I get to see her first thing. 


Fuck yeah!


(PS - Wellcome Collection has a brain exhibition on: fuck yeah!)

Day 219: Grateful Again

I'm back to being grateful again. Today for a workday full of play with the ever-wonderful Jack Rebaldi. I'll have the pleasure of playing/working with Jack and David all week tomorrow, all exotic like. Based on today, I'm pleased and excited about this. I think it will be good, enjoyable hard work. 


And after that, a great show with some lovely people. I'd say technically not the best show I've ever done, but full of goodwill, playfulness and things learnt. I loved it. Marc and Brent are very nice indeed. We get to see them play tomorrow night at The Miller. I think it's going to be ace.  Get In. 


I have grown yearn-weary. It's not where I want to be. I'm not sure if I have failed it or it has failed me. It's an experiment I am glad I did, and I realise I don't get that good glow from yearnign. Gratitude is where it's at. Let's dance.

Day 218: I'm NOT ROMANTIC!

I've just had a 'first' experience. Never before have I laughed, cried and weed at the same time. Never before, in fact, have I ever ever watched YouTube while on the toilet. I don't know what possessed me, but the idea tickled me. Maybe because I'd just started watching something. Once I'd started, I didn't want to stop, so on my way upstairs, I stopped off and... there we go. It was this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_v7QrIW0zY&feature=player_embedded#!


Okay, so I do cry at a lot of things, especially when it involves people being really nice to each other. And this is cheesy - it really is - but how wonderful to do something like that, to play that way and to know someone so well, so intimately that you can create something like this that will delight them. It's a big deal. What massive fun. I have never felt that way about someone in the whole of my time alive, but if I ever do, I hope I'll have the nerve and the conviction to do something flamboyant and tailored to please them. And not just to do with a marriage proposal. 


One of my favourite memories ever was organising a friend's 40th birthday celebrations. It was nothing like this scale, but it involved trickery, secret planning and lots of details that delighted me to do. The whole affair, from conception to execution, made me very happy, and it was a lovely, lovely day. Just imagine...!


Speaking of lovely days - God, I enjoyed the last few. I loved playing and chatting and being a twat with the School of Law lot. Lots of familiar faces (I have such trouble with names, for far longer than is acceptable). But a full day of that, a quick drink a perfect chicken and fabulous evening catching up with Ruth on Friday felt like it couldn't be topped. 


Yesterday was playtime with Marc and Brent from Canada, who turned out to be delightful, playful and warm. Great to watch them interacting with each other in such a listeny and clearly loving way. There were new people - Vaughan, Alex and Heather from Cambridge (thanks, Claire Kerrison) and others too. Fabulous to see Jimmy again, looking good and playing well. Great to play with Charis, Henri, Juliet, Benni, Pamela, the Cambridge crew and everyone. I had a lovely evening with Henri, Benni and some Turkish food and tonight, thanks to Gareth, I got to see two impro sets and the outstanding Trodd en Bratt for free. And now home and to my too-hot bed, with the prospect of a rehearsal and a show tomorrow. Wooooooooop! Woop. 

Day 217: Yearning #17 - Bridging

I am yearning to watch the next episode of The Bridge. Really yearning. But I did that yesterday and I didn't blog, and whatever happens, I want to. In a rare display of delayed gratification, then, here I am, all blogful and diligent and enjoying it already. 


It's so much more, but if for nothing but the pleasure of my fingers tapping on the keys with more confidence than accuracy, it is good. I still have a tiny swell of pride at the fact I can touch-type, and even that I type more accurately when I close my eyes than I do whenI look at what I'm putting on the screen. 


I loved my women today. Women whose names I mostly don't remember, even though we've been reintroduced again today. I only see them a couple of times a year at most. Kat and Blondell and Nat/Nicky I remember and I enjoyed my time with them very much today. Nicky/Nat has both names. It's not that I've forgotten. It's thanks to her that I am roughly on my path, or on the path I'm on right now, doing roleplay and other such work with Power Train et al. She put me on to them for a German job in 2007 and I've been working for them on and off ever since. Lots of other lovely people too. We laughed a lot. I do like a lot of actors. Surely not all, but this lot are generally so nice and funny and full of all the stuff they're involved in. I love them. They're open and accessible. They make me laugh. I thank them for that. 



I'm honoured, too, that I got to have a special go on Cristian, Vic's lovely new man who's making her so happy. We laughed and ate at Leon - a much healthier option than I'd expected - and then in true Pikey Queen style, Vic produced a voucher and we paid considerably less. Very pleasing indeed. I liked Vic's man. That's good, isn't it. I did bollock them for being cheesy, but I'm very happy for them. When you do a marriage, Vic and C, can I be your clown, please? Every wedding needs one of those. I'm yours.

Day 216: Yearning #16 - Yesterday

All my blogging seemed so far away. It's because I finished off the day before's blog yesterday. So this is, in fact, yesterday's. And today's.... who knows? 


I'm on my way home already, from Nottingham. Hence the internet. That's odd, to be in both a venue and a hotel where wifi is unforthcoming. I had to buy a cup of tea in the hotel last night to get my free hour's internet there. Well, not free, exactly, is it, given that I have to buy something, but the cup of tea was tasty and welcome, and tasty and welcoming was the young man that served it to me. He gave me a lovely compliment that made me blush a bit, but made me smile. It was nice. He was handsome and far too young, and evidently a charmer, but it's nice just the same, and I said thank you.


I also had a gift of an evening. Instead of eating with clients, which I always enjoy, we decided to make the most of the balmy day by going for a walk, and walk we did. Pat and I walked all the way along the canal from Nottingham to Beeston (we reckon that's about four miles) partly just because it was lovely and partly in the hopes of finding some chi-chi gastro-pub that would give us our tea. What we did find was so much better. We walked (just over an hour's worth in all) to Beeston. As Pat put it in the telling then next day 'we walked so far, we reached the seventies'. We did. We landed in a pre-everything Pontins-style 'entertainment centre'. It was ace. There was a scruffily carpeted bar, looked after by an elderly lady with a bandana on her head. The roof was low; the building was a pre-fab. It led to a tiny arcade room with machines in and a toilets labelled 'Buoys' and 'Gulls'. Through the middle, a corridor led to the canalside cafe bit. Pub picnic bench seating all round, full of dogs (use any level of metaphor you like), skin burnt red around tattoos and mountains of fried food. The tattered sign said 'Beeston Marina' in semi-classy Italics, partly peeling off. 


Our gammon and chips, with two eggs each - a snip at two 'luxury' dishes for a fiver was delivered with gusto and eaten the same. There was salad cream for our chips and very yellow mustard for the meat. Martin Parr (whose birthday it is today) would have celebrated with a snap for an exhibition. It was mint. 


Ours was such a comprehensively fried meal, and so moreish, that we felt compelled to walk the journey back. About three quarters of the way there, my feet and back were cross and tired, but the rest of me was fine. We'd walked into darkness, past a rich sunset, ducks, a heron and some bats. Going to bed was worth it last night. Sleep seemed earnt. All that to excuse my non-blogging? No. Just because. 


If I yearn for anything today, I think I yearn to stop yearning. Is it helping? I don't know. Maybe it's just too open (for anybody's liking). What you yearn for nags at your stomach and sometimes gives you shame to chew on. I've felt it during these past few weeks. So I want to do some more acting work, where I do the kind of job I can think of as 'proper'. I now no longer doubt that I'm an actor, but have I done the kind of job that makes me feel like one? Not properly. Not yet. Don't get me wrong - I LOVE the work I'm doing. It feels like play. It pays. It's fun and it's useful. It covers a lot of bases. But I would be lying if I didn't admit to yearning for the opportunity to do films, be in 'proper' plays, use improvisation even more and do more with it, and see what it has done to me as a scripted actor. 


And if I'm honest, it's not even about the ego of the work. I don't want to say I've done films and stage plays because I want to preen. That's where the shame comes in. I want to do it partly so I can say I did. So I can hold up my head and say I knew what I wanted to do and I went for it. I can't say that yet, and that's a source of shame. If I ever have children, I want to be able to say that I have had a taste of that, and that I do it still. At the moment, it's not true. Not yet. Not yet.

Day 215: Yearning #15 - Perhaps

Free internet on the train, because I'm in a carriage that's half Standard Class and half First Class. That's good, isn't it? 

I yearn for a romantic/dating experience that is genuinely really exciting, not contrived, feels like the right thing to be doing, not like riding someone else's bicycle, or wearing the wrong shoes. I yearn to feel that achy, pleasing, not-knowing feeling, that hope, that gleeful infatuation. I yearn to be that little bit out of control of how I feel. A little bit overtaken by hormones. In a good way. I yearn, even for that 'oh yes' feeling that I've had with places to live, jobs, opportunities but never, yet, really with a partner. Not really really. That's not to knock some of the delicious people who have been kind enough to fill my belly with butterflies and make me smile without meaning to When They're Not Even There... But it's not what I hear it can be. 

Perhaps I'm not putting enough into it. This has been suggested to me many times before. Perhaps I need to buy a skirt and buck up my attitude. Perhaps I need to stop thinking about it. Perhaps I need to, as a sibling said many years ago 'choose to accept that it's not going to happen and get on with living your life to be as happy as you can in every other way'. I can't say I really took it entirely in the spirit in which it was meant, which was in fact very positive indeed. My cross face only comes back when I'm deciding to be cross about it. The intention behind it was just to get on with being happy and not let that get in the way. It's a simple game, and one worth playing. I think I play it now. Perhaps it's because of what she said. Perhaps not.

Thankful for my free internet, for my fabulous room (top floor, view across the city, furthest room from anywhere - very pleasing) and my flat double bed with starfish sleeping potential. That'll do, pig. That'll do. 

Day 214: Yearning #14 - Laaaaaaaa!

Yesterday, two sweet Eastern European boys in Pret on The Cut gave me a free cup of coffee. Today I saw them both again (I didn't go specially - I was at The Calder Bookshop there and I dropped in) and it was like we'd met yesterday and I'D done THEM a favour. They were so lovely. Those things just make a day richer. 


I loved the Goatsong rehearsal today. It was rich and funny and full of meat and juice. I can't wait to see Michael bite the legs off a heron. It's not in the same show, but it's something that I really want to see happen before I die. 


Speaking of such creatures, Ruth and I saw a cormorant today, very close, making its way around the pond. The pond is open all the way now, which really is terribly exciting. And it was lovelier than can be told to see Ruth today and to get to spend some time with her. Yearny to do that a bit more. Very.

Day 213: Yearning #13 - Word Feast

Don't mind if I do

I have the focus of a small child at the moment. Shiny things take away my attention and don't give it back. And I haven't even blogged for two days. It's a strange feeling and not one I've very much enjoyed. I yearn for that feeling of inspiration and wonder (thaumazein) that I was infused and enthused with in the first months of this blog. I still love it, but I don't feel that it's taking me (or anyone else) to new places any more. I missed it, though, and I disliked the procrastinatey feeling it induced. 


Things I've been aching to put on there, though, are how very, very lovely pretty much everyone I met in Dublin was, from the bus driver who let outs out at 'not a stop' and gave us directions to get to our hotel to the lovely hotel staff, our taxi driver on the way back and generally everyone we spoke to. The cleaners in the airport were really helpful when I was trying to find my lost credit card wallet. The bus driver was amazing. A woman got on just after us who was very claustrophobic and needed to know if the bus had to go through any tunnels. Instead of grumping at her, this man told her to sit right at the front where she could see him and promised to talk to her constantly as they went through, and that she should talk to him all the way through whatever she was going through. And he did. He kept her distracted (while keeping his eyes forward) and made her journey so much better. And mine. He was ace. 


I learnt some new words today. Thaumazein was one of them. I learnt that from someone's online dating profile. It's that sense of wonder. I'm glad there's a posh name for it. Very glad. It deserves one, as well as the simplest of names and wordless looks and sighs. And I learnt words here: 
http://sobadsogood.com/2012/04/29/25-words-that-simply-dont-exist-in-english/
Thank you, Rob Grundel. 
I especially like these Japanese ones:

1 Age-otori (Japanese): To look worse after a haircut

2 Arigata-meiwaku (Japanese): An act someone does for you that you didn’t want to have them do and tried to avoid having them do, but they went ahead anyway, determined to do you a favor, and then things went wrong and caused you a lot of trouble, yet in the end social conventions required you to express gratitude. 

25 Yoko meshi (Japanese): literally ‘a meal eaten sideways,’ referring to the peculiar stress induced by speaking a foreign language.
The first, I know. Thank you Vidal Sassoon Leeds, when I was 15. You deserve an Age-otori lifetime achievement award. The second too. I love it. I love its complexity and the simplicity of its verbalisation in Japanese. I like this last one a lot. It's a meal eaten sideways, so maybe it's a bit more laborious, but there is still pleasure and nourishment in it. That's how I feel about speaking other languages. In fact, it makes even the simplest, most boring of tasks more interesting to me, to do them in other languages. ... Why do I still live in this country? What a simple, fulfilling gift I could be giving myself by living somewhere that would offer me that pleasure. 

Forelsket, apparently

I was charmed by the Norwegian word 'forelsket', which means the euphoria you experience when you are first falling in love. Partly because I can imagine that being very nice and just the ticket right now. And because a beloved friend of mine is experiencing just that right now. She's proper, proper, proper in love, as is he. She even looks different. She always looks pretty, but right now, even in pictures (and particularly pictures with him in too) she looks like she's swallowed a daylight bulb. It's coming through all sparkly. What a worthwhile euphoria that is. How nice for two people to make each other buzz like that. Aha... and here we are on yearning again. Result! I think I've been letting that slip. 

What's for tea?

I also discovered this today. It has made me very happy. 
http://twitpic.com/9mw2b7

One thing I have always loved about The Tiger Who Came To Tea is the slight hint of threat I see in that tiger's eyes. It's always smiling, and it's nearly always looking right at the girl with the side of it's eyes, like it's wondering where in the meal she fits. The huge difference in size adds to that. 


In the back of my mind, many very pleasing incidences from the last few days are dancing, but just out of my line of vision, or they're whispering out of earshot. Or just teasing me. They will come back, and I'll taste the delight they brought me again. When I do that, I'll write them down, on my forehead, if I have to, and I'll get them in here. Another good reason to blog daily. Fresh, fresh. 


Oh, and while we're on yearning, a kiss would be nice. I can live without it, of course. Just sayin.

Day 212: Yearning #12 - Yearning Opportunity

Really very little to yearn for today, apart from perhaps that it might be earlier than it is (being already tomorrow). 


I got paid to laugh with nice people today. I got paid to go a tiny bit too far (and make it seem like it's completely overboard). I got to watch Jerry act like a twat within my line of vision (but nobody else's) - I will never be able to think about Nutella again - and I am now in a rather nice hotel, all ready to let my head hit the ample pillows. 


Yesterday's hotel was not quite as nice, but I absolutely loved the duvet cover. I think it was brushed Egyptian cotton or something - or perhaps just really old - but it was actively soft on my skin. Worth sleeping naked in. Worth oversleeping in, so I did this morning (though not in a way that would actually affect anything, which is nice).


I witnessed a coach driver talk a woman through claustrophobia as he drove through a tunnel and reassure her all the way. Then he pointed us in the direction of our hotel. We effectively ignored him and instead of walking for 20 minutes, we must have walked for about an hour to find it, but oooh, the sense of achievement when we did. And now I shall make the most of it. 


Yoga tomorrow. Get that arse in gear, love. It will thank you. 

Day 211: Yearning #11 - Owlsong

I'm entirely spent. I yearn to have been asleep for an hour already, and to be bathed in dreams. I've had some outstanding ones recently, from the very graphic birth of a too small baby from my sister to a random person from a previous life (that sounds too new age - I mean a previous town - oh the melodrama) knocking on the door asking for a towel after having a shower, even though he already had one. I've had great universes open up over the last few nights. I yearn for even more.


I'm off now, to invite it. Bring it on.


PS - once again, I'm stupidly grateful for so much, though, and I do really want to say it. I'm grateful for how much I'm loving this job, and for a. how much Jerry (the other actor I'm working with) makes me laugh and b. how disgusted he would be to have made it onto my blog. 


I'm grateful for a pleasing bit of playing and an evening of tip-tappy, reasonably frantic working. Great fun. I'm grateful for Rob's relentless patience with me. Also for Michael's fabulous email, Vic's tasty text. I'm grateful that I get to be a bit silly, flirty, ridiculous as one of these characters. Again, it is made very clear to me indeed that I limit myself so deeply with my mind. What do you MEAN, you don't know how to flirt? That's ridiculous. I can really do it in character, which means I can actually do it if I want to. It doesn't mean I have to, but I can, and nobody's made appalled objections. So maybe today I yearn for a different kind of sanity, and a different kind of confidence.


Night, then.

Day 210: Yearning #10 - Development Opportunity

I yearn to be the kind of person that doesn't fuck around on facebook at midnight when they really should be in bed. But I'm not. I am an enemy to myself.

Tired eyes

Day 209: Yearning #9 - Big Wheels Are Turning

I can both be grateful and yearn for the same thing, I have discovered. I've just come back from watching the conclusion of the 50-hour improvathon. I'm blown away. I've seen performances that made me want to kneel down and worship a good few people. 24 players did the full 50 hours. There were some fucking AWESOME performances. 


Of course I yearn to be part of that. I really do. I'd like to get all juicily involved and be on that stage. Susan Harrison was such a delight to watch. Mark Meer (who had a bit of a following at the end of last year, I think, and has a fresh groupie batch this year thanks to his massively consistent, funny and brilliant villain). There are too many people to mention and in the case of a whole bunch of them, I never even found out their names. The final scene between Seamus and Dylan will stay with me for ever, and two scenes made me weep like a drunken bag lady. And at all the same time as this healthy yearning tickles the pit of my stomach, I find that I am delighted by the benefits of not just having done 50 hours of improv. I do not have jetlag, as those players will. I would gratefully suck it up if I did, but I don't, so I'll suck that up instead, more easily. Fewer lumps. 
AND - there's nothing to stop us doing another one. We can ALWAYS do another one. 40 hours this time. 


And oh, the people I've seen over the last few days. As always, it was a pleasure to see Simon on Friday, and Rob strutting his funky jazzfinger stuff on keyboards for the show. A bunch of fine Germans, with whom I ate Vietnamese noodles after the show. And Ed Bennett. It's been MUCH too long since I saw him. And the very lovely and horribly talented Jack Darrell, sitting in the audience. Such a shame he wasn't in the show, but very nice to see him. Watch that name. Get to know that face. You'll see them both on billboards. Some people, you can just tell. 

And finally (because the minutes are almost at the point where if tomorrow is to be of any use at all to me - and it really needs to be - I can't afford many more of them awake), I yearn for this. Thanks, Viv Goodings. For many of your posts. Today for this. 

Day 208: Yearning #8 - Sensible

Best 'Fuck Yeah' picture EVER

I yearn to still be at the improvathon, but I'm being sensible, so I'm going to bed. Just saw Susan Harrison join the cast. As always, she was totally yessy from the off, and an absolute pleasure to watch. I'm blown away by so many of the cast. Some of the songs I was present for during the last few episodes made me yearn to be so skilled and talented and brilliant as they were. The Sondheim hit that Lucy Trodd, Sarah-Louise Young and Ruth Bratt sang was stunning, and Ruth's solo number as Aphrodite made me cry a little bit, it was so good. 


I also yearned to be at Catherine Semark's gig tonight. If I could have been in two places at once, that's the other place I would have been. I rate her massive high, that one. And I had the pleasure of her for a few hours this afternoon, before her gig, before my trip to the improvathon. She's ace.


Fuck, yeah, all round, that's what I say. 

Day 207: Yearning #7 - Improvathon

Bleary-eyed and fickle of brain, I'm just back from a first instalment of the 5th London improvathon. It really is very good indeed. I've just got home (and it's almost quarter to eight in the morning). I shall sleep and then go back, at least for a while. And I'd really like to see some on Sunday evening. I really would. 


I wonder what my dreams will do. Greek epics, no doubt. Big stories. Togas. Goats. I'm in an altered state of consciousness. It's nice.

Day 206: Yearning #6 - Sshhhhhhh

Like this, only smiling

I yearn to speak Russian and to read that tasty script, like code, without hesitation. I can't wait for that moment when my eye and my brain are so connected that I make the sounds the letters suggest in the echoey caverns of my mind. 


I yearn for silence. I'm in the bar area of the Ibis hotel in Nottingham, where two smartly-dressed women are talking very loudly to each other about things that to me are absolute banalities. They're quite close together. No need to speak that loud. But if I'm honest, they're not TOO loud. So I take it back. It's not silence I yearn for, it's headphones. And Russian rap.

Nothing like this

I'm not sure what the two male hotel people are saying, what stories they're weaving, but I love the stifled snorts and high-pitched squeaks that Ana, the female member of staff, keeps leaking out from behind her hand. And her face. It's mint. I like the Hungarian man, Gabor. He smiles bigly, all teeth. He is helpful with an undertone of grump. But the smile makes you think the grump must have been imagined. He has a little-boy face, in some ways. Wide-eyed like a rabbit. In a good way.

Or this, but this is so cool

I yearn for a loose, relaxed back. I'm doing yoga and stretches every day now, and it's at the stage where it seems to be hurting more than when I don't. I yearn, still, for the community of the yoga lot. I heard from a friend that I was mentioned there and the ache set in again. I loved being fully committed to being there once a week. I loved the yoga. I loved the wrapping up in all of that. Ah well. So it is. So it is.


The Ibis hotel chain uses the same font as Monopoly. It's a fairly pleasing font made much, much better by familiarity. My heart warms to it simply because I know it. I feel like I'm about to land on something and get a bonus, or be thrown in Jail (ha - old habits die hard - when writing the rules of a Monopoly game, Jail always takes a capital letter). 


My arse hurts. I yearn for that to stop. I'm sure it will. 

Day 205: Yearning #5 - Gratitude Cheat

Ambreen's latest joke. Erin is a right cock.

I still yearn for focus; I want to know what it is I want to do more than anything, and what I can do to make it happen. One thing to say: I'm enjoying playing every day more than I can possibly say. I love the dynamic we're building, me and Jerry and the characters we play. What I love is that the characters stay the same people but every day, we build on whatever we're given by the people in the room. So far, it's never felt tired. It's always fresh and interesting and some of it new, and the bits that are not new seem to be growing into themselves. I'm loving it and I'm finding out new things all the time.


I've just had the best call with Rob. Gutted to have missed his show last night - it sounded like one not to have missed - but this evening's chat made up for all of that. Idea pie again, and bouncing back and forth. I'm lucky to have this man as a business partner (my fingers really want to type 'panther') and to get to collaborate on ideas. I'm excited about what we can do and I can't believe we're lucky enough to be doing it. It's not just luck. Rob has done  lots of work and good asking to make these opportunities happen. I wish I had his drive sometimes. I don't, though. I have mine. 

Sleep tight.

I'm grateful to the man downstairs, who I think may be from Romania, who has allowed me to use the cable internet for an hour in return for buying a cup of tea. The wifi wasn't working. I really needed to make this call to Rob and he was all busy saying no, so I asked. Yes, he said, reluctantly, but then he did it. I will nip downstairs and thank him in a moment, and I'll post this blog now and continue it for tomorrow, so it goes up before the click goes off.


Tonight I yearn for more of these opportunities to have ideas and play with people. I love it. And I yearn to do more and better and bigger acting jobs, ones which involve playing all day every day again. It's not about the content of the play/film/piece. It's about the process. And writing too. I'm running out of time. I want to write. Fuck. Meta! I AM writing, feeling panic in my belly because I'm running out of time, when I'm creating this situation in its entirety (in and of itself, as J would say with her tongue rammed in her cheek). 

Day 204: Yearning #4 - Random Quangle

I yearn for my own monster

I played again today. Paid to play. YEEEOOORRRSSS! And I got to walk a dog and have breakfast made for me by lovely, funny, pleasing friends. And I got a bus. And got a very exciting email from Rob. Brilliant. And, and, and.... so many things! 


I tried to go up to London to see Excursions, a night run by my very talented business partner Rob Grundel. He's ace, and Excursions is an ass-kicker of a night, which I LOVED last time I went. Got to the station, train delayed. Then some more. Then some more. Then some more. By the time it got to the prospect of travelling for 2 and a half hours to be there for about an hour, I changed my mind. If only I'd thought to leave earlier (my ticket is valid - I was waiting for a cheaper slot with no need), then I'd have been. Yearn, yearn. 

I yearn for sense and meaning and Mitgefühl

However, I did have dinner with a bunch of lovely people in Brighton and came away with some outrageous and brilliant recommendations for books to read as well as some fabulous stories. And here I am, nearly blogged up, and it's only just past ten. I'll sleep with gentleness, and for my country. And I did my yoga/stretches, Day 1 of 21. I'll record exactly what I did, so I can get an idea of where I'm going with all of this. And maybe some other details too. I'm still yearning for that yoga body. Maybe the yearning needs to turn into action. Maybe I too will have 'a body like a racing snake'. 

I yearn for this body, with my face, only thinner.

Inspired by all these books people write, I yearn to do the same. What story would I tell? I just don't know. Who does? I suppose we find out most by doing. Do! DO! Please do. 


I'm back to being grateful. Grateful for people like Sue and Karen, Catherine, J, people encouraging me along with this new blog direction, even if it's just as an experiment. That's all it is really. A yearning to find out something new. 

Day 203: Yearning #3 - Ruff

So, I’m supposed to be yearning but right now, I feel full of gratitude. I suppose I could muster a yearn. Let’s see.

I am grateful for the guidance, expertise and deft fingers of Simone, the osteopath who is treating me at the moment. She’s lovely, immensely knowledgeable and very good at what she does. She operates out of a small therapy room in her home. I suppose that if I were to wish to yearn, I could ache to find a calling for my life that fits me as glovily as hers fits her. She’s a yoga teacher too. She has a skeleton suspended from a hook in its head. She has a rubber spine to hand. I’m a little bit taken with anatomy and physiology, so perhaps I can even rack up some jealousy. Nah. Not jealousy. A bit of inspiration, perhaps. And thanks to her (and Esther Lilley Harvey, from afar) I have committed to 21 days of yoga from tomorrow (8^th May) until Tuesday 29^th at least. Week by week, perhaps I can return to my austere start to the year and cut out caffeine, sugar, eating after 9pm. It suited me, that did.

Ah, ah, you see. I yearn for a lean yoga body and a ski-slope cheek landscape. I yearn for a core so taut it can deflect bullets. I’d like to be chilled like a yogi too. And to be able to do headstands.

The lady on the train today was delightful. She smiled, laughed, changed my ticket with no extra charge. She eclipsed the somewhat shoddy railway staff I had encountered today – the man who sold me my ticket, bristling with irritation. Customers are idiots – that’s what was coming off him like steam. And then a string of people who couldn’t be bothered to think about my question of the quickest way to get to my destination. Then a couple of people did help, and I had the good fortune to land on Jean’s train. She had a beautiful face, like the mother from The Railway Children, but older. Fabulous crows’ feet and a gentle, witty buzz.

I love Jessica Loudon and her family. They are great. Of course I can yearn for what they have – their delicious boys, their laughter, their lives – but I’m just glad they have them. Mine isn’t going to be the same, wouldn’t be even if I had what they have. We’re different. My version, whatever it might be, will be itself.

Archie is a male version of this dog. Doleful. Sweet. Solid.

Same with Sue and Mark and Amy. I loved how welcoming and seemingly happy to see me their vintage Staffie, Archie, was to see me. I love a dog that lets itself be petted and doesn’t even mind a kiss or a raspberry on the forehead. And it is a delight – an absolute delight – to see these people. I love them. They are mighty, mighty, mighty good eggs, all. We did very proper accents later this evening, and imagined Amy as a debutante. I cursed her. I put upon her that tomorrow, aged 15, she would wake to find herself able to communicate only with the diction and language of a Jane Austen character. Forget Freaky Friday. Poshvoice rocks! We laughed a lot.

So yearning comes harder today, but I suppose I do yearn for newness. I suppose I do.