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We’re in a double deadline nightmare in the Herring household. My wife has to finish her sixth book (get her with her 6 books) in the next few weeks and I have to get the first draft of my script for the sitcom I’ve been involved with before Christmas Day.
Oh and we have to be ready to host our first ever Christmas.
There is some tension in the house.
I like to have the whole day to work when I am writing and any interruptions throw me off easily, but, of course, we have two children so that makes such luxury difficult. Today Catie’s mum was helping out, but I was still down to take Phoebe to her swimming lesson. That’s OK - the parents just sit by the pool while the teacher does her job and whilst it’s nice to watch and encourage, there’s also time to do some writing. I elected to write my blog as my daughter learned how not to drown.
So I had my laptop and a bag of Phoebe’s swimming stuff and a bag of her stuff for nursery (which was our next destination). We headed off in the new car and I experimented with working how to extend the mileage. Turning off the heating and air conditioning does quite a lot, though that means you have to travel with your coat on, like in the early days of car travel when vehicles had no roofs!
There was no danger in me not making the swimming pool and back, but Catie was driving to London later and I wanted to leave her as much battery as possible. I was doing over half an hour of driving. Would it cause her to be stranded later?
You’ve got to love the jeopardy, but I had saved the planet by doing this journey with electricity rather than diesel so could be proud of myself.
Unfortunately in the chaos of drying and dressing my daughter after swimming, I cleverly left my laptop at the swimming pool. I didn’t notice it was gone til I was home and couldn’t get through to anyone at the pool (it’s actually at someone’s house and they hire it out for lessons). So my only option was to hope the laptop was still there and drive back. Not only would that eat up another 45 minutes of my day I would have to go in our diesel car, as my wife was about to head to London and I wasn’t sure I’d be back in time, but was sure that there wouldn’t be enough charge for her if I did the drive again. So the planet was unsaved again.
No one was at the pool when I got there, but luckily the door wasn’t locked. There was no sign of the laptop and my heart sank, but I checked some cupboards and found it.
That was lucky. But by the time I was home it was now mid afternoon and I was coming down with some lurgy or other and it was basically another day of writing gone up the swanny, just because I was too stupid to remember to pick up my laptop after putting on my daughters shoes.
And if you have any idea how much I love my laptop then you’ll know how crazy this is. I wouldn’t be upset if I’d left behind my daughter -she’s nearly four and can fend for herself. But my laptop. That is irreplaceable.
Maybe I just need to see the whites of the enemies eyes before I can get on with script writing anyway. But even so, I fell asleep at my desk when I tried to work. It’s all a bit too much.
But we’ll get through it as we have a thousand times before.
In other news I have finally taken the parking permit from our Devon holiday in June out of the car. It's been sitting there since the 9th June and has long since lost the ability to let us park in the hotel in Woolacombe. But congrats to me for leaving it in the window of that car for so very long. I will almost miss it now.
The Birmingham RHLSTP in March has sold out. 1100 tickets and three months early. It’s as discombobulating for me as it must be for any long term fan of mine, who can usually count on turning up on the night and having a row of a theatre to themselves. So thanks Birmingham for coming out in those numbers. Keep an eye on Twitter for returns and release of company holds. Or come and see
RHLSTP in Bilston near Wolverhampton instead/as well. Whilst everywhere else has sold out in double quick time, Wolves and its environs refuse to buck the system.
More tour dates will be released very soon. If everywhere supports the show as enthusiastically as they have in Birmingham, Manchester and Brighton (which I think is also sold out, but we may be adding an extra one slightly earlier in the evening) then I will put more in. So don’t be complacent London -
make sure you buy tickets to the next run if you want me to keep doing so many in your terrible city
