This is another of those relentless weeks and I am exhausted already. I really should try and factor in some rest time, but yesterday it was Buzzcocks (and in the morning an interview with the Culture Show) and today it was C&H podcast 91 and a student gig. I do not have a day off til next Tuesday and I really must take one this time. Or I am going to get ill again.
I slept in til 11.30, but could have stayed in bed all day if Collings wasn't turning up on my doorstep with the papers under one arm and his computer under the other. I had drunk too much after the Buzzcocks show and wasn't in the chirpiest of moods, but sometimes when I am grouchy that can lead to funnier podcasts. I am not sure that that's what happened this time,
but judge for yourselves. Some of the urethral material was quite funny, but otherwise I was lying back on my sofa wishing I was dead. Or that Andrew Collings was. One of the two. Maybe I will murder him during one of the upcoming podcasts, but if I do it will probably never get uploaded, because he's the only one who knows how to do it. I might have to mortally wound him, so that he can upload it and then kill him.
We're rapidly approaching the 100th podcast now and we discussed whether we should continue on after that. I am sure we probably will, but I have to say that producing so much free stuff is starting to wear me down a little bit. Two hours of podcasts and seven blogs is a lot of work and whilst it is slowly paying off, that won't do me much good if I have died of a heart attack. In a week's time I will have written a blog for every day for seven years. That makes me feel a bit sick. Yet that means I'm only 1000 or so days away doing it every day for ten years. To the compulsive obsessive that I am that is temptingly close. But to the increasingly old man who would like a little bit of time to enjoy his twilight years I think maybe it's time not to be quite so fastidious about all this.
I believe I said the same thing last year, but I think that maybe when I go on holiday over the new year I may leave my computer at home and take a fortnight off from everything.
As for me and Collings we are enjoying ourselves too much to stop just yet and after more than four complete days at the computer mic we are only just starting to do jobs that are reimbursing us for our time. So don't worry about the podcast Richard Herring. He's just trying to scare you into
buying tickets for our shows or
purchasing DVDs or books. If I was you and had had all this stuff for free I would be ashamed if I hadn't given just a little bit back. But if you don't want us to profit then
a small donation to SCOPE would seem to be the least you could do.
It's only your support that keeps us going, unrecognised as we are by the controlling forces of official media or awards committees, so anything you can do to remind us that this is all worthwhile would be much appreciated.
I was regretting accepting tonight's gig at UCL as I trudged towards the venue. I really wanted to be vegging out in front of Battlestar Galactica or The Wire. My fatigue meant I had already missed attending Charlie Brooker's latest book launch by going to the wrong Yorkshire Grey pub. And on arriving at the student union all my worst fears seemed to be being made real. There was much raucous shouting and singing coming from the building and inside drunk children (of about 20 years of age) were running up and down the stairs in rugby shirts. There was sick all over the toilets. I felt very, very old, yet the smells and sounds took me flying back 20 odd years to when I was a student myself. I was old enough to be the father of these youngsters and if my second girlfriend had actually become pregnant (as for a couple of nervous months we thought she had) then I might actually have been one of their fathers.
Luckily though the comedy gig itself was upstairs from this living Hell and was attended by a very discerning bunch of people. It was just a lovely gig in front of a smart crowd (my hubris joke got the biggest laugh it has ever received) and totally lifted my spirits. I did a 40 minute set and typically and annoyingly felt rejuvenated and perky afterwards. I have a dream job, however annoyed I might get when it doesn't allow me the chance to have any R&R.
The compere at the gig mainly works on TV these days and had some friends along with him. It was somewhat of a jolt to realise that one of these friends was the movie star Neve Campbell. I have been meeting a lot more famous people than usual of late (though of the level of Maggie Philbin and Carol Vorderman) but the student union bar of UCL was the last place I had expected to see someone that famous.
I had of course been in the same room as Neve before,
when she was chatting with Mackenzie Crook whilst I pretended to work. But now Neve Campbell was right in front of me and shaking my hand. "Hi, I'm Nev," she said.
I wanted to say, "No, you're pronouncing it wrong. It's Neev, not Nev. You're Neev Campbell." But I didn't. Nor luckily did I say, "You're Neve Campbell! You lezzed up with that chick from that film about alien insects in that film with that other guy from that other film! Though you didn't take your top off like she did," as I had imagined I might in that other Warming Up. I just said "Thanks." Having read the entry back I am glad that I didn't go on to say, "Oh I wrote about you on my blog!" Though she seemed charming and down to earth enough to have been able to enjoy my stupidity. We briefly talked about how strange it was to be back in college after all this time and then she went off into the world, hopefully to somewhere befitting of her celebrity status where the toilets weren't blocked up with vomit. Or if they were it would be the vomit of a celebrity.
