Saturday 3rd October 09

Quite an early start... good to have friends here and more chats over breakfast.

But at 9.30 I headed off down Heslington Road to see my friend David, who's gathered together the best of the photos he's taken of Professor Fiddlesticks since Christmas, and put them in a file of about 40 or 50 images. These are ones we both liked from each shoot, one at the Novotel on Christmas Day, one in the Museum Gardens, one at a kids party and one a week or two back at Linton on Ouse, where he also acted as my driver between two gigs.

We went through them and got it to about 12 good images, including cropping some with Photoshop software to make them frame up nicely. We agreed to do one more shoot, next week, to get a couple of specific shots. Once we have our 'top ten', David will create his idea of a publicity leaflet.

Came back via Country Fresh and picked up a sack full of compostables and two boxes worth.

Then zoom back, made my sandwiches and cycled at top speed (when the wind was behind me!) up to Hartrigg Oaks, which took just 20 minutes, to attend an AVP core group meeting. Members came from as far as Newark and Bradford, as the group is one of the AVP regions, which we call NEEM, North East and East Midlands (don't ask why we have a regular from Bradford!) and it was a very productive meeting, with several new attendees, which is always nice. My official role is Health and Safety, but I contribute quite a bit, since I've been involved in the organisation since at least 1994.

This drew to a close at 4.15 and I again bombed home, but I stopped in two places for different reasons and got in at 5.

Then I needed to prepare to go to Beverley for the Food Festival tomorrow.

I got the 8.15 bus from just outside the house, with just my big unicycle, my sports bag of sticks, balls and diabolos, my rucsac with costume, wash bag and balloons, 'handbag' with reading material, hairbrush and some edibles, and my laptop, which I wanted to have some offline time with, to delete stuff from my nearly always full inbox, which I have a problem doing with the distractions that happen when online.

I got to Beverley bus station in an hour, and to the Cross Keys within 10 minutes, and got my room keys without hassle. Once I'd dumped my kit in my room I went back down to get a pint, and back to my room to delete emails from various folders. I think I got rid of about 100. A nice quiet evening.