The light in my kitchen has been on the blink for about two weeks and I keep forgetting until it's dark and I want to cook. It's quite good fun because it flashes on and off so it looks like you're cooking in slow motion, but you do have to carry boiling pans of stuff around the house so that you can see how it's coming along. The situation has resulted in a couple of pretty spectacular meals though so I think I'm going to keep things as they are. Also, how are you meant to tell which kind of neon tube you need? I've never figured that out. Also the washing up looks less scary in the dark.
I played at the Folk Club on Friday night, supporting Heidi Talbot, John McCusker and Boo Hewerdine, and had a very nice time. It sold out (I'm not sure I've been involved in a sell out gig before) which meant that there were a big lot of people watching me. They were queueing all the way down the stairs during the soundcheck - I've never seen anything like it. As ever with folk audiences it was almost impossible to tell how I was doing - I'm pretty sure I could've been stood making fart noises with my armpit and there would've still been the same amount of polite applause, but a fair few people came up and said nice things after. For my part, I thought I sang and played well and my in between song talking was working fairly nicely for once, but I forgot the words for a bit at one point and sang the second verse of Radio Silence twice (I've never ever known that happen either - maybe it just happens at sold out gigs). Nobody seemed to mind, but like I said, how would you tell? Setlist: You Won't Break My Heart, Watertight, This Place Is Dead Anyway, Radio Silence, The Ghost of Paddy's Night Past, So Finally a Love Song, Edinburgh, Soaked to the Skin.
I didn't get to see quite as much of the main act as I'd have liked due to being stuck outside the room, and restless, but they make a lovely noise and John McCusker is quite incredibly good at the violin and, that rarest of things, tasteful with it. It was a treat to see someone as important as that in such a small room. I got a copy of Boo's new CD which I'm enjoying listening to right now - there are some songs on there that I've been waiting for for years.
We went to another, much better, conference in London last week. They gave us lunch, the talks were fairly interesting and the free bar at the party (in the O2 Arena no less! I'd not been there before - it's very big and has a Nando's) didn't run out until 1am. It also had weird robots made of security cameras who were doing strangely hypnotic gyrating pole dances. They looked a bit like the clones from Star Wars. The only downside of the whole event was that I'm not useful enough for anyone to want to talk to. Real People actually do seem to spend their whole lives either trying to network each other to death or embroiled in pissing contests - who knew? It's pretty depressing, and another reason why I'll never amount to anything. Still, that whole Docklands area will be pretty nice if they ever finish building it - I was particularly impressed with the ornamental massive cranes they have. I was also pretty impressed that our hotel served breakfast from 4am until midday. You'd really have to work at missing that.
The spare time I've had had been spent watching telly and making a better version of "Ball and Chain" than the one that appeared on the Edinburgh ep that I did a few years ago. I was a bit worried about watching Antiques Roadshow on my own, as half the fun is guessing the value of the pieces, but it was fine, How I Met You Mother has reached a point that I've not seen before, while still being hilarious, and I've been enjoying Emma (I think because the actress who plays the title role looks a tiny bit like Drew Barrymore) - it's the only one of Jane Austen's books that I didn't totally love, but maybe I'll try it again. It's going to be a pretty close run thing between having another CD ready and reaching my self imposed Scars selling target for making another CD I think. Though actually maybe it won't, as I don't have any more gigs sorted out and the only effective way of getting any more seems to be to wait quietly for them to fall into my lap.
Right. Time for Masterchef: The Professionals. I think they should have a round where they try to prepare Michelin Star standard food in a kitchen where the lights are strobing. I reckon I'd be in with a chance if they did.