I didn’t realise I missed it.

I use to live in London, before I ran away and joined a circus that mainly toured London Parks so I have spent quite a bit of time there. I went up yesterday for the first time in ages and realised I miss it, as soon as I stepped of the train in fact. I am a self confessed people watcher; I have been from a very early age. You can fill many a spare hour just watching people go by and I'm sure this is one of the reasons I never get bored. In London there are just so many to choose from and from the watchers point of view they seem to be a totally different class from any where else. We went up to watch the first night of 'Much ado About Nothing by Red Shift Theatre Company'. Tweedy Directed the Physical Comedy so it was kind of work but a night out all the same. I did find it very hard not to laugh whenever I said "Tweedy is directing Shakespeare". Actually I didn't even bother to try. Having watched the production I can now easily say it without laughing as I think he did a really good job. The whole show was good and I'd recommend it if it comes near you on tour. http://www.redshifttheatreco.co.uk/frameset.html

I survived...

OK I know as a mother this isn't something I should say but, I really don't like children very much. I really don't get the expression 'I don't mind other people's children because you can give them back'. I have never been one to coo over a new born baby, or any baby come to think of it. Now a puppy is cute, but a baby!! Before Willow was born I think I had only held one baby and that was my (sort of, that's another story) Sister. I don't think I liked it too much, she was screaming the place down as my mum phoned the doctor. I disliked (not sure if I disliked them but I really didn't like them) children so much when Tweedy and me decided to get married it was on the condition that I would not change my mind on the kid issue. I use to get told "Oh it will be different if it's your own" Me, I couldn't see it making a difference. (OK you where right on that one) Then one day something bizarre happened. At the age of 33 (for one reason or another) I changed my mind, shocked the hell out of me I can tell you. So here I am, the mother of one of those child things. I like her, she is great, we have a laugh and I love us hanging out together, but it does bring about problems. And the biggest thing for me to deal with as a mother is she likes other children, she wants to have friends round for tea and stuff. She has even spoken about 'a sleep over', and to say I'm not looking forward to that is an understatement. This week Willow turned 6 and asked for a birthday party, actually she has been asking for one nearly everyday since her last birthday. So on Monday we (Yes I made sure it was a day Tweedy was home) collected six 5 year old girls from school and walked back to the house. I had been dreading it, my idea of hell. But actually it wasn't too bad, though Tweed should take most of the credit there. Three hours later there had been lots of (very loud) laughter and more importantly no squabbles or tantrums, not even from me. What scares me the most is I'm starting to get use to having other kids about, at this rate I may even start to like some of them lol. Actually I think it may be too late and it's already happened.

Edinburgh

OK all my good intentions of blogging regularly while I was away with a life didn't quite go to plan. I'd like to say it was due to me actually having a life but it was more down to having no wireless connection in the evenings when I had the time and very limited Internet access during the day. So this is just a quick update.

Edinburgh had the potential to be great but we where just too busy and tired most of the time to take advantage of it. The weather was pretty rubbish as well which didn't help trying to convince people to take a flyer, but I guess I wouldn't want a soggy flyer either. Willow was seriously unimpressed at her work load and handed her notice in and moved to Aberdeen. It was the longest I'd been apart from her and I didn't like it.
I think she dealt with it better than me.

So 'Tweedy's Lost Property' had brilliant reviews but unfortunately they came towards the end of the Festival so didn't help ticket sales, though numbers did pick up a bit in the last week. If you where one of those that travelled up, down or across to come and visit and show your support, Thank you and hopefully you thought it was worth it.

Seems a bit mad that we will be back up in about 2 months, but I'm really looking forward to it.

Photo by Claire Cox

http://living.scotsman.com/comedy.cfm?id=1341802007

http://edinburgh.threeweeks.co.uk/detail_edaily.asp?id=5674

Stockton

Apologies for this blog being posted well after the date but there is a reason which will become clear.

22nd July 2007

The 320 mile drive to Stockton-on-Tees went fairly well without any major incident or delay, well that is if you don't count the jam caused by a couple of ponies playing on the M1. The journey was also made easier not having the dog who wants to stop every half hour just to smell the grass. She has stayed at home and I miss her loads though obviously not during the journey.

Tweedy arrived an hour or so before us as he hadn't been held up by prancing M1 ponies, to be met by the lovely locals who thought it would be a nice welcoming gesture to throw eggs at the caravan. I don't think it was a personal thing as he wasn't the only one to be egged. Of course as usual the hostile ones are the ones who seem to be the biggest fans by the end of the week and it's certainly better to have them onside than having a full scale battle.

I didn't really feel that safe wandering about Stockton on my own in the evening and it didn't help having bright red hair, but I don't want to look like Vickie Pollard or wear a white shell suit to fit in thanks. Just for the record, white shell suits have 'never' looked good especially if you are over 6 foot and male, and dripping yourself in loads of gold does not help the look.

And the reason for the late blog, not wanting to get re-egged (it's a bugger to wash off) or stoned, yes we had that too. Well till the next time…

No more itchy feet

I'm not sure how much time I will get online over the next 6 weeks so if I don't reply to anyone's messages and stuff I'm not being ignorant just busy and internet less. I am just hoping for good library and internet café connection. Luckily these days Willow is happy to play games online while I check my emails, I just need two putters together.

So tomorrow there will be no more itchy feet as we hitch up the caravan and get back on the road. First stop 'The Stockton Riverside Festival' and fingers crossed the river stays where it is meant to be and doesn't come creeping up to the tent. And now back to squeezing the contents of a house in to a caravan, and hopefully we won't forget anything.

Poodles and snails!!

It is not a good idea for a dog to use a snail as a Kong.

At least she didn't crunch the shell!!!

Windsor

On my own again for two weeks, anyone would think Tweedy had got another job with the circus…

Oh hang on; yes that's what he's done. At the moment he is helping 'Happys' out a bit, and then he is off to Windsor for a week with 'Zippos'. We did think about going to spend the week there too, but not sure we would see that much of him so I'm not sure there's much point. Well maybe just a few days to say hello to everyone.

Holiday

I'm of on holiday tonight and as usual I'm really organised and still haven't packed. I guess I should get on with it, and try to get excited. I'm sure me and Willow will have a great time, wish Tweed was coming too but we thought he would be working. As it is he is only working today, so my last day and he isn't even here, typical. I'm sure he will keep him self amused, Smarts is fairly close so guess he will be over there and Happy's has started rehearsals so I'm sure he will pop over there too.

As for the house he already has plans to fill it with junk, sorry I mean props.

What will I return to?

Great finish to the weekend.

What a great finish to the weekend.

We went and saw The Barenaked Ladies at Southampton Guildhall. I really enjoyed myself and they where really good and very, very silly. An added bonus was Boothby Graffoe being support which I never realised till he came on. I worked with him in 1991 in a small venue which was probably the size of the guildhall bar.

The rest of the busy weekend went OK, which is great because it could so easily not have, for so many different reasons.

Lush

After a rubbish weekend (my fault for having high expectation's or any expectation's) I have just melted into a Lush Black Pearl Ballistic bath bomb, and drifted away with Captain Jack himself.

Oh yes I am in heaven.