As I was Saying

I've done almost everything this month, and jolly good fun it has been too. After my one appearance as John Slater's driver/stand in Lighting bloke a few weeks ago, he called again last Sunday as he'd been let down. This time it was a less glamorous job - Van Driver And Bloke Who Dropped Off Set/Cloths/Lights At Various Places In London. Now when I say less glamorous, I mean the title was, but scooting round the Opera House, Royal Ballet and various other central London locations was actually, to a theatre anorak such as myself, quiet exotic. And John lead in his posh van. And it was great to do a job where I had no responsibility. Plus, as someone who occasionally lives in London and therefore never drives in town, it was a real novelty! And if, like me, you never drive in central London, let me tell you the congestion charge has worked a miracle! You can almost get into second gear in the centre now. Of course, the Euston Road and other routes just outside the zone are another matter...

So that's that. In addition I had an interview for a Masters Degree at a University in London. This is pretty cool, considering education and society generally had written me off as a child when I failed my 11 plus. (I think I might be dyslexic with figures - I would often get letters the wrong way round. But now we have calculators it doesn't matter. )

Then, I finally got my remortgage through which, although it was less than I needed at least allows me to put £10k into Maverick Theatre and give it a chance of life. There are 2 or 3 dear people that Maverick still owes money to. I won't name them, but they were involved with the creation of the Henry V - Lion of England tour and the relaunch of the company and although they will probably never work for me again, they will also probably never know how grateful I am that they understood our particular problems and when they could have got very shitty indeed, they decided to give me the benefit of the doubt and just be patient. It's not what typical commercial businesses are supposed to do and it is so brilliant that they decided not to be typical. Be assured, I have a list in me head of people who have been kind to me and Maverick and if we ever do make any real dosh, they will get first choice of everything.

We may have an established venue prepared to co-produce Hancock's Finest Hour. That too is very good.

I had a phone call from a former colleague and now a chum and I am going to be doing some inserts into the breakfast show of Smooth-fm in the West Midlands for three weeks soon. I also have a couple of standing tickets for David Tennant (Dr Who) and Patrick Stewart (Star Trek) at the RSC I can't use. They are apparently like Rocking Horse Dung, so I might head for EBay.

And I still get the odd mail about BRMB, and having gone to a doo last week maybe I should do a bit about it. But it's too late now. Although when I first met John Slater....