Thursday 25 April 2013

Not so internal monologue

I don't drive, well I do, I'm learning and so I'm not allowed to drive without supervision just yet which means I have to suffer the bus to work two out of every three weeks when I can't get a lift from Ian. The other day I happened to still have my iPod paused as I sat down and I really couldn't help but earwig on half of a conversation. 

There's a girl on the bus, she's in an anorak, hair scraped back, glasses on, her earphones are in, her phone is in her lap, she's talking non-stop, there's nobody next to her. For about 15 minutes of the bus journey she was seemingly suffering from a case of severe verbal diarrhoea and I couldn't concentrate on my book

You ignored what I said... You did

She's in trouble for not responding to a text now... 

My alarm goes off at 6, I woke up, changed it and went back to sleep. Didn't even acknowledge my texts, I just changed my alarm and went back to sleep. Babe I just changed my alarm. I'm sorry

I've text her saying I'm on the bus and she's not even acknowledged it 

The cheek! She's just been saying she hadn't read any texts and there she is complaining about someone ignoring her texts.

In between words she's sniffing, I can hear her despite my earphones being in (music off, obviously, I need to know what she's going to say next)

Yeah well you won't see me till Friday so let's hope you don't wake up with it on Sunday... But do you throw up? I get the bug but don't throw up, that's why my mum doesn't believe me, that's the problem with having a good immune system.

At this point the woman sitting in front of me started mouthing something to a woman on the outside of the bus. She was doing that thing where rather than speak you mouth the words in a really exaggerated fashion because that makes it more clear (it doesn't). 

Someone else speaks

I'm done in mate, done in

I can't distinguish any of the people any more, there's a low level of noise, nobody's conversation stands out now. I have no excuse not to be trying to plough my way through The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo so I put my iPod on random and leave the strangers all talking to themselves. Is it always like this on the bus?

Friday 12 April 2013

What I live for

I know I've bored on about them a lot but I'm going to do it again. I fucking love this band and last Friday, as always, their live show didn't disappoint.  I've seen them a lot of times, it's funny, you get to recognise people in the crowd, they're almost always there, the rotund man with the sensible short back and sides and a shirt, always making "duhn nah nah" noises along with the guitars when there are no lyrics to sing along to. The tall boy with the long blond hair who we first saw at a Ginger acoustic show in Wales, the two men who look like each other, both long hair, one slightly smaller than the other, always there together. Then there's the man who looks like a portly teddy boy, he's always there too. It's nice to see these people, we don't speak to them but, you know, we nudge each other and say "look, there's that one..." when we spot them. Anyway, they were all there last week, of course they were, they're big fans too. 

Ordinarily when we go to gigs we arrive either during or after the support bands have been on but knowing Ginger always picks brilliant people we try and get there on time, we learnt this one year, after we almost missed out on the amazing all metal tribute to the Bee Gees, my life would not have been the same if I hadn't known of this band.

Anyway, Friday was no different in terms of brilliant support. We saw Baby Godzilla, a brilliant new band who spent a lot of the time stomping through the crowd while playing, it was really quite something. They were followed by the Eureka Machines, I'm ashamed to say I haven't heard them before but I loved what I heard, I'll be investing in their albums now. Then it was time for The Wildhearts, they were brilliant, especially considering they'd only rehearsed mere days before. The second half of their set was truly inspired, two of their roadies took to the stage, Dunc on the right, Steve on the left, each one held a sign with a different song name on, the crowd had to cheer for their favourite, whichever one got the most cheers the band would play. Some moments I was genuinely torn between the choices, other times I was dying to hear my favourite track.  I was genuinely gutted when it finished but today they've announced extra dates in June, they're playing Leeds the very night I'm going over that side of the Pennines to watch Europe's Strongest Man competition, I think it's fate, I have to go, don't I? 

Monday 8 April 2013

The Mousetrap

On Saturday  we went off to the Liverpool Empire to see a matinee performance of The Mousetrap, the world's longest running play. I've wanted to see it for a long time and it didn't disappoint. By the way, whatever you do, don't look on Wikipedia to find out anything about it, there is a major spoiler on there. I won't divulge whodunnit, as with the play Ghost Stories, the audience are sworn to secrecy at the end of the performance so I'm keeping quiet. It's bloody brilliant though and if you get a chance you should definitely go and see it. Anyway, since I'm not going to give anything away I shall instead share the general theatre experience... I'd thought Ian and I might be some of the youngest people in there, we weren't far off that and most younger people were there accompanying what I assumed to be elderly relatives. Elderly relatives who, seemingly, all had coughs, throughout the entire performance people coughed, not so loud it ruined it but audibly enough that you could be aware of it, it drove me round the bend. Another thing that drove me round the bend was the man behind us, he talked non-stop before the play opened, despite his companion not really responding, not that she could have got a word in anyway, he barely stopped for a breath...

"When he was in Brushstrokes years ago he was a lot younger" - talking about the actor Karl Howman

"If you took a tumble you know very well you'd fall right down them" 

"I get vertigo on two steps"

Then he said something about the height of the cupboards in his kitchen (I can't get away from sodding kitchen cupboards, can I?) followed by "Mexican platter Tuesday, Indian stuff on Sunday" 

"When you think about it... the boxes, them two either side of the stage, if you sat in them, you wouldn't see a thing" 

"It's incredible, all the fancy work" - talking about the decorative ceiling

"I get the same nausea looking up as down" 

"I'm clinging on with my right hand trying to look at the ceiling" - you'd think perhaps if he felt that sick he might just not look up, surely?

Then, thankfully the play started, at which point the two people sitting on the end of our row decided to move somewhere else and the people sitting on the end of the man with vertigo's row decided to move to ours so then the rest of the people on their row moved along two seats. I honestly don't think the audience at a pantomime would be as annoying. They drank pre mixed cans in the interval, they'd brought plastic cups with them especially. At least he wasn't coughing, I suppose I ought to be grateful for that small mercy.

Incidentally, I accidentally look at this (don't look if you don't like mice) on Wikipedia when I was trying to find out if it was the longest running play in the UK or in the world. Mice are one thing I fear most, I did not need to see that page at all.

Not so much a review of a play, more a review of a man behind us, sorry about that...

Friday 5 April 2013

My one true love

No, this is not about my husband, this is about a love which has been here long before he was around. It's been going on for 18 years, I still remember the first time, one afternoon in 1995, it was in my attic bedroom in the house I grew up in, I feel like it was a sunny day but I don't know if it was, perhaps that's my memory being clouded, I'm imagining it to be more than it was. I sound like a right twat now, I was Just in Lust...  and I have been ever since.

 Tonight The Wildhearts are on the Manchester leg of their 20th anniversary tour in honour of their Earth Vs. The Wildhearts album and I am so fucking excited about it.

Like smell, music dredges up so many memories for me, this is why I can't understand people who don't like music, for as long as I can remember I've loved music, I don't even know the last time I went a day without listening to something, singing along, dancing to it. Like the lady with rings on her fingers and bells on her toes, I have music wherever I go (doesn't quite work, does it?)

I'll be back with a sycophantic post about how amazing it was, no doubt...