Saturday 28th May 11 The Crucible at The Theatre Royal

A good day, I woke at 9.30 and had a fairly lazy morning, watching YouTube videos of Gil Scott Heron, Rest In Peace, and thinking about an artwork that I'd like Dexter to do, based on a list of words from my first 40 years. Explored word clouds and typography.  Oh, and a little bit in the garden and chopped up a bit of fruit.

But my main appointment was at 1pm at David's, for lunch with him and Lotte. I'd received a message during the morning about the Green Day at York Minster, so I went early to say hello to assorted friends... Mark and Bernie at Bikerescue, Kate on the Rowntree Park stall, Jenny Hartland, and Ben from Freecycle, others from York Rotters and St Nicks.

I couldn't spend long there as I needed to visit the shop on Stonegate to explain about the bill for cleaning the inspection chamber, and then on to David's.  The owners of the Stonegate gun and knife shop wee OK, didn't attack me.  The chap said that he'd find out the ownership of the lane behind his yard, which he thought was a shared ownership. I'll go in next week to find out what he's decided.

Lotte had made a thing she called a tortilla.but I would have called a Spanish Omlette.  It was chunks of potato, asparagus and peas in a load of whisked egg... cooked in a circle like a quiche (although I suppose quiche can be in any shape!) which is what I originally thought it was.  We had this with some slices of ciabatta bread.

For 2pm we headed down Stonegate, saying hello to Purpleman, and went to the Theatre Royal.  We made ourselves known to the staff... as we needed to be taken round the back to get to the Theatre in the Round Stage.  We waited, David bought a programme and I read it.  I knew nothing about The Crucible, but the programme was a basic introduction to the Salem Witch Trials, which I did know a little bit about.

A lovely lady took us to the rear entrance which is wheelchair accessible and our seats were right on the edge of the stage.  I was very impressed with the production; it was very well done.  The story, especially at the end, left me thinking about injustice and the ridiculousness of religion and dogma.  At the end I was quite shocked and emotional.

It finished at 5.30 and I took David home, made him some tea (OK, microwaved a meal!) and we worked out my May hours.  He felt like going out so I took him to City Screen where he met a nice couple from London whilst I was getting him a coffee. We didn't stay long, went back, he gave me my cheque and I cycled home, getting in at 8pm.

I had difficulty loading and playing the little films I'd made with the headcam, although the position on the cables on my handlebars is better.  The sound and images don't match, with the images going slower than the acoustic track.  Also, the files no longer load onto the computer as I'm allegedly missing some sort of codec and it closes down on me.  BUT I can go to 'My Computer', click on Removable Disc E and find them there, and then copy them to a file in My Videos.  So, do-able but not brilliant.

A peaceful evening, with a really rubbish film on TV which I didn't understand.

Friday 1st April 11

Woke fairly early with headache which lasted all day, despite medication.

Spent the morning doing stuff in the house, including replying to my agent (which I later hand-delivered).

I went to buy bread and got a good 'yesterbake' deal from Thomas the Baker on Tang Hall Lane.  I chatted with the guy who delivers the unsold bread and rolls etc to this shop, where it's sold for half price and two for one, so effectively quarter price.  Anything still unsold after this goes to a dog biscuit manufacturer in Doncaster, I think he said.

On the way back I said hello to Jamie, who had 'news' for me... a tree had blown over in his garden overnight and he was busy chopping it up for me to take away!  He also showed me his petrol chainsaw which he is thinking of selling; he showed me how it worked, which it did first time.... but then it refused to start again. 

After lunch a BT Openreach van drew up and our next door neighbour explained that the cherry tree in our front garden had swayed around so much in the wind that it had pulled his phone line out, as the lines to his house and ours go through the tree's top branches.  The good thing is that since the tree is ours, and the damage to our neighbour's line, he doesn't get charged for the repair.  BUT if our wire comes off due to our tree, we'd get a large bill for the repair.  So I got my big stepladder which reaches up to 9 metres, and spent over an hour carefully lopping back quite a few branches so there were none brushing up against either of the wires.  Then I spent more time pruning these branches down into stove-length sticks and shreddable twigs.  The smaller sticks went into a paper potato sack where they'll sit for a year or more to dry off.

I collected our youngest son, taking his bike down on my trailer, via my agent's house which is near the Steiner School.

In the evening I cycled to the York Open Studios event at Bar Lane Studios. My good friend Jonathan, who is the artist Dexter, was showing his work, as were dozens of other people..... I met loads of my friends and really enjoyed myself.

Came home via Freshways and brought back a trailer full of compostable goodies. 

Aiming for another early night, as feeling ropey.

Monday 24th November 08

Spent the morning getting ready to go down to London, back late Tuesday night.

Cycled down to the station in good time to get the 12.53 but it had been cancelled, so I checked that my ticket would be valid for the next train down, which was at 1.36. This gave me time to cycle home again and pick up my NewScientists which I remembered I'd left on the couch as I was cycling down the first time. Back into the station by 1.15, found the 1.36 to be running 10 mins late so I had my sandwiches in case there was a severe lack of space on the train, as the signage said 'standing room only'.

However, although the train was quite full, I got a seat and sat next to a young chap taking a 'gap year', whose parents live in a smallholding near Salisbury, and we had a good chat about coppicing and several other mutually interesting subjects. Arrived in London just before 4pm, and as I'd arranged to meet Ruth at 5 in Ealing, I went for the tube immediately, topping up my Oyster Card with a tenner first. Went to Oxford Circus, got lost between different tubes but eventually got directed to the Central line (I think!) to go to Ealing Broadway. Arrived there at 10 to 5, found a phone box and rang Ruth at work, and 15 minutes later she arrived and we walked to her car in a nearby carpark.

She lives about 20 mins drive from there... if she used public transport, it would take over an hour and she doesn't cycle. We caught up the past year's news whilst she made an apple crumble using a neighbour's apples, and a pizza using mostly pre-made ingredients... they were both delicious.

I showed her my list of 'Dexterwords' to see if she could help me add anything, after all she's known me since I was 18 when we went to college together in Northampton. It provoked lots of memories and chat. A nice relaxing evening.