Edinburgh Festival

I spent Saturday in Edinburgh at the festival (I know there are really about 13 festivals). I saw 4 shows, 3 pre planned and 1 on the spur of the moment. The first was an audience with Clarke Peters who plays Lester Freeman in "The Wire". He is a really cool guy who has worked on one of the best shows to hit our TV screens. It was great to see his relaxed interaction with the audience (who lets face it at 11am on a Saturday morning were probably die hard fans) and his thoughts on the war on drugs and the state of TV writing were interesting and thought provoking. The Clark Peters show finished at 12.15 and the next show we'd booked for was at 6pm so we had plenty of time to kill. Over a beer in the udderbelly pasture we listened to many pluggers for shows, most from the actual performers themselves. This is something that really strikes me about Edinburgh, the performers are really out there asking for your time. We decided to go and see a one man show called "Francis the Holy Jester". It was a monologue translated from Italian in to English on various stories from the life of Francis of Assisi. Not the sort of thing I was expecting to see when I got on the train that morning, but it was uplifting.
After a quick beer in the Pleaseance Courtyard where we saw Peter Duncan and 1 of the "4 poofs and a piano" (on his own with no piano) it was time for Newsrevue.
This was an excellent well polished show. The songs and sketches were just right and captured the art of satire perfectly. I really like hearing alternative lyrics to well known songs. The highlight for me was the version of "popular" from Wicked with David Cameron as the Glinda character and Gordon Brown as the Elphaba character.
Our last show was the main reason I'd arranged to go to Edinburgh - Richard Herring's stand up show. I always really liked Fist of Fun and the stuff he did in the 90s with Stewart Lee and the stuff he wrote for Al Murray. I've also been listening to the Collings and Herrin pod casts for a while as well as reading his blog and following him on twitter (I hope I don't sound like a stalker!) . So I've been aware of his latest project for stand up for a while and was really looking forward to seeing it in person. It didn't disappoint and really made my day at Edinburgh complete.

The Airport

I love to travel. Seeing new places, experiencing new cultures, looking at ancient or not so ancient things I love it. But I hate the Airport. I get stressed. A red mist descends and I am insanely paranoid about missing the flight, being stuck in Security, not being allowed to check in, being found with 105ml of something in my bag... the list is endless. Until I'm on the plane I'm a nightmare. I have no fear of flying (well I don't like turbulence, but who does?), and once we're airborne I'm happy. I just don't like the Airport. I don't know what it is. I get the ferry and the train with minimal fuss - there is just something about the Airport that drives me to distraction.

Keeping in Touch

What's the best way to keep in touch and how do you decide who to keep in touch with?
We have 100s of friends on facebook, follow people on twitter and even have 100+ numbers in our mobile phone memories. But even so I find myself interacting with the same group of people all of whom I was in regular contact with before social networking took over my life. There may be the odd flurry of tweets or wall posts when someone "new" is discovered (and by new I mean from infants school) but generally after a while you settle in to seeing the odd status update and that's it. Not even that in some cases if they don't post their status (or they post their status too much so you hide them from your feed).
Then there are people you meet in person. You might give them your number and they give you their number, but you can't quite work out when/why either of you would ever call. Yes you can have my number but we know we won't be speaking till the next time we happen to be in the same place. However human interaction beats internet interaction (she says as she is typing a blog on a train avoiding eye contact with the people around me) we have after all be interacting one to one in person for thousands of years.
So I've decided to make the effort. The next time I see someone and we swap numbers I am going to text them or the next time someone adds me on FB I will send them a message. Maybe it will lead to a new member of my small group or maybe they will ignore me, but at least I'll know I've made the effort.

Ashes

Hurrah that England have regained the Ashes. It has been fab to watch the cricket over the summer and the series has been so entertaining. From that fantastic slog by Collingwood and last wicket stand from Monty and Anderson in Cardiff all the way through to the last tests excitement it has just been amazing. I have been following Aggers, Bumble, and bbctms on Twitter and this has made the experience so much better. Even though I may not interact with them reading their tweets has given so much extra insight to what is going on. I've totally loved it.

Spelling Errors

OK OK so my spelling sucks. Sorry. I've become lazy through using so many electronic forms of communication where they auto correct you, or predict what you want to say that I didn't even think about it. I have my email set up to auto spell check, my blackberry and i-phone do auto text so mis-spelling is rare (mis-typing however is frequent - but that usually involves a whole different word rather than just a spelling error). I do try to use correct forms of words and punctuation but the last blog post I was not successful. I have now corrected it (I hope) and I promise to pay more attention to my language use in the future

The Cat

The Cat
Originally uploaded by mrs_od

After writing yesterday's blog about Lavinia I thought she deserved a picture! So here she is. prrr

Mice

I've got a cat called Lavinia. She is a lovely cat and I know it's in her nature, but she keeps on bringing me mice. It distresses me. It's bad enough when she's killed them outside and brings them in dead, but recently she's taken to bringing in live mice.
Last night she brought one in and dropped it on floor in front of me. It just sat there cowering, but because I shouted at Lavinia it ran between two bags. Husb then got the two bags and opened the back door and dropped the mouse outside. Lavinia proceeded to sniff around looking for the mouse. I really hope she didn't find it and get it later on. Even if she did I'm glad she hasn't brought it in as a present.

4weddings

I have been watching 4Weddings on living tv. I'm not really a fan of reality tv any more. Back in the day I was all over big brother etc but as the years have passed I've gone off seeing people who just want to be famous for no reason. I like things like location location location and property ladder where you have interesting experts but stuff like the X factor, Cash in the Attic, Come Dine with me just make me want to switch off. And I do. But there is something about 4 weddings that I can't resist it. I don't know why. I would have hated having a film crew and 3 other brides hanging around at my wedding passing comment. I just like seeing the weddings and hearing the other bride's opinions. Since being "the bride" I can't help but compare the weddings to my own. I realise this is pointless as I'm always going to prefer mine. And ultimately that's the issue of this show. All the brides prefer their own. So it seems to me that its often the nicest bride that wins no matter what her wedding was like. It seems to me that in weddings and in life, personality goes a long way.

Manchester Monday

Yesterday I went to Manchester and back for work. I'm not that good at getting up early so the 5am alarm really was a rude awakening. I got to Euston in time for the 7.20 train and was pleased to find I'd been booked on a super advance ticket in first class. I like travelling on trains long distance (not such a big fan of the daily commute) but have to be at the station at least 15 mins before my train is due to leave so I can get in to my (usually booked in advance seat).
When you book a seat you are told your seat number and each seat is clearly marked. It always amazes me that so many people either don't understand how seat numbers work or are too stupid to notice the coach letter and seat numbers. And these people are always the loudest. They unashamedly show off their "i can't find my seat" stupidness to everyone on the train. I have to sit on my hands to stop myself from getting up and showing them to their seats like some sort of train usherette.
I got to Manchester to find that the whole of the tram system had been closed so had to get taxis to and from my destination. Was so paranoid that I wouldn't have enough cash and that the taxi drive would shout at me I got £100 out of the cash machine but it was only £12 each way. I resisted temptation to spend the extra cash t in any of the shops in Manchester Piccadilly.
My meeting was shorter than expected so I got a train 2 hours earlier than I had planned and went straight for the unreserved carriage so was not disturbed by anyone looking for their reservation.

How to start a blog...

I wanted to blog but didn't know where to start. Well obviously I worked out that I need a blogger account but it was the what to say rather than the how to say it. Then I joined twitter. Then I got addicted to twitter (and am now on over 1000 posts) and realised that I could say what I liked - people will follow me if they want to or they'll think my posts are inane and won't. So I got over my fear and here I am. I don't know where I'm going with this in the long run. I'll just let it develop over time. I'm enjoying it so far.