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Oooh four months to fifty. Only just noticed. The countdown was much more on my mind a decade ago.
In the weird tour hinterland, spending a day in my room in the Premier Inn, West Hull, right by the Humber Bridge (as I assume it’s called), but more or less in the middle of nowhere. I had two scripts to rewrite and a make your own pot of porridge for breakfast and a salad I hadn’t eaten for dinner for lunch.Plus two cups of instant coffee from my little tray of beverages. I don’t think I have ever experienced more showbiz glamour in my life.
I was struggling a little bit with getting episode 3 right, played Civ II for an hour and a bit (after intending to be in it for 20 minutes) but it did the trick. I came back to the script and it all slotted into place. Though it was mainly now about moving caravans from Delphi to Vladivostok. Hope my producer doesn’t mind the new direction.
This all looked like it would help my diet at least.
After script 3 was done, I went for a walk to the local nature reserve. There was a man in a little caravan selling coffee. His sign boasted he had cappuccino, but his sign was lying. I had another cup of black instant coffee and headed down the hill for a walk through nature. The loneliness of the long distance punster (which would be a better joke if I had more than two puns in the show) used to bother me. But now I rather like it. There was a lot of dogging going on around me, by which I mean, people walking dogs. But I wouldn’t be surprised if come the evening there was a bit of the other type of dogging.
After watching the dogs frolic around in an orange coloured pond, I headed back to the hotel and started slow work on the final episode of Relativity. It was much too short as it was, so I had to think of a sub plot or two to help me through. It seemed unlikely that I was going to find anywhere that served a very healthy dinner, so I popped next door to the pub restaurant where I managed to source a haloumi salad. I also had a coffee and discovered that by buying one cup you got unlimited access to the Costa coffee machine. Damn, I could have worked here all day and had 15 cappuccinos for £2.50. The North is a strange and wonderful place. I am, pretty close to where I was born. These are my people.
The haloumi salad was a bit slight. I wasn’t sure it would see me through the gig and then the long journey home, but Barton-upon-Humber was pretty much shut when we got there. But the Ropewalk is an old school and classy venue and there was a lovely cheese plate and some humous and crisps and Curlywurlies waiting for me. I managed to resist most of the naughty stuff, but it was a life saver. Not many venues provide more than water these days (and some are even a bit grudging about that), but this kind of thoughtfulness puts an act in a much better mood for the show and is more likely to make them want to return. It seems a pretty smart use of £20 to me. But what do I know?
And this arts centre clearly knows what it’s doing as in spite of never having been here before, the gig had long sold out. It was an eclectic crowd. There was a 16 year old at one end of the front row and a couple who looked like they might be in their seventies or even eighties at the other - all here for my family show. And one of my favourite things of this whole tour was watching the elderly couple giggling merrily at my rude jokes.
Backstage before the show I had made really good progress with the final script and knew what I wanted to do with the final few pages, when my computer was taken from me for the show. But I knew I had a three and a half hour journey home tonight and it seemed fitting that I should be finishing the work with just ten hours or less until the recording began. Tomorrow may be a tough day, but I realised that the busyness of the weekend meant I had not had time to get nervous about acting alongside some of the absolute legends who are in this series. It’s really very exciting.
I felt in the first drafts I had probably been overly concerned with not giving myself too much to do and had felt that my character’s partner was under-represented too. But now, I think, I’ve given them a bit more character and a bit more of a real relationship. But there’s ten more pages in every script now, so there’s loads for everyone. Whether it can all make it into the final edit is another question.
Backstage there was also a table-tennis table. I tried to play Me1 vs Me2 table tennis, but I am not sure it will catch on in the same way as the snooker. I didn’t manage a single rally of more than one shot, but did get my paddle to a serve once or twice.
So I am writing this at midnight, about two hours from home and eight hours from when I need to be waking up to go to work. But the script is done. And I even managed to record an intro to next week’s RHMOL extra. It’s been a crazy week, but I don’t feel too exhausted just yet and have relished the tight schedule. Necessity really is the mother of invention. Somehow I have got this all done. It might be terrible. But it doesn’t feel like it is.
The cough is almost gone now, but boy has this bug persisted and I even managed a mini-jog when I was out.
2017, on a personal level, continues to be cracking. Goddamn world events for conspiring to ruin this nice little run of happiness.
