2011: a time limit blog.

I'm going to set the stopwatch, and give myself the target of putting down in type everything of interest I can remember (just kidding, none of it is of interest) about my 2011, in an hour. Just to see what happens.

But first, New Year's Resolutions, hurray! (You'll see them here first... and possibly just here, if I forget to tweet them or remember that nobody cares). I made 6 resolutions last year, and kept 2 of them. 1 of the remaining 4 was unachievable (I've made it again for 2012), which really means I only failed half of them. Right?

2012's are as follows.

1. Phone up my old saxophone teacher and book some refresher lessons to get me back into it.

2. Relating to (1), find some other people who play music and play music with them - it's the best way to prevent me from stopping playing again.

3. Perform the Charles II rap from Horrible Histories on a stage (select audience, by invitation only)

4. Set up a savings account / money pot and put some money into it every week (I don't know how much yet, or whether it's better to have a set amount or vary it depending on what else I have to spend on that week - thoughts?) in order to save for a holiday to Orlando in 2013.

5. Find a flat or house or something somewhere (money pending).

6. Work for Pixar.

I'm confident I can do (1), even if I have been putting it off for most of 2011. (2) may be difficult, but if I can find the people, I can do the rest of it. (3) I've given my word to do, and I don't think I'll be allowed not to. (4) I hope I can do. (5) and (6) I made last year, (6) I make every year. We'll see.

There was also an extra resolution to hear my friend play flute somewhere, but I don't remember if that was a regular promise I made to her or an official New Year thing.

If I can do 3 out of the 6 on that list I'll be happy. 4 would be great, 5 even better.

But anyway.... stopwatch at the ready... here comes a brief history of my 2011. As if you cared:

THINGS OF THE YEAR

Film: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2

Album: Foo Fighters, Wasting Light

Theatre: Pretty much anything I saw in London in June! And Robin the Hood, of course...

Gig: Roger Waters or Hugh Laurie.

Book: I'm not sure how many books I read this year actually came out this year. But since so much of the year was spent reading A Song Of Ice And Fire, I'll go with that anyway.

Game: WWE All Stars. Don't laugh, you can be The Ultimate Warrior and it's lots of fun with friends!

Event: The Royal Visit - great day!

TV programme: Horrible Histories. Where has it been all my life?!

Place I went: Oxford was really nice ... but then I did get to go to Disneyland again...

Moment: The solo of 'Comfortably Numb' on top of the Wall. Jaw dropping (literally).

Personal highlight: The first time the audience laughed, in the first performance of the panto. A year and a half of stress, worry and work instantly became totally worth it.

Year in review, here we go!

JANUARY

Pantomime was performed. See other blogs for details, but to summarise very briefly... painting, building, lots of time, lots of stress, no mics, monsters, Native Americans did not have blonde hair, yes I'm aware we have a strobe light, THEY'RE ACTUALLY LAUGHING AND ENJOYING IT, practically sold out, lots of fun, the end.

Went to see The King's Speech. Was youngest person in cinema by about thirty years. Felt young. Was good.

Had great conversation about Shakespeare after one panto performance, which appears to have stuck in my mind.

Had meeting with manager. Was not fun.

FEBRUARY

Did 20 half-hour talks in two days as part of recruitment for work. Voice was tired afterwards.

Did hiring and boring work stuff that I hadn't been focusing as much on because of the pantomime.

Spent a day in Leeds with friends, which was nice.

Finally got to see True Grit , using the discount advantages of being a Friend of the Cinema, which was a nice present from the panto cast and crew. Westerns!

Had post-panto party, which was fun. Got a big movie-size poster signed by everyone, which is still on the wall - as is my very own 'Keep Calm And Canny-On' poster. Got a really nice card and some cool photo collages as well. You guys! Very happy director.

MARCH

Prepared for the Big Seasonal Opening... didn't really know what I was doing but I appeared to be in charge of some of it ... fun!

Was asked to write a pantomime for local drama group. After much discussion, settled on Rumpelstiltskin. Got to work scribbling it down.

Was visited by some speakers who'd come to walk to the people about work about porcelain and art. Porcelain way more interesting than you'd think.

Did rotas and things. I hate rotas.

Was reminded how to extinguish fires (happens every year, to be honest).

APRIL

Got on the front page of the Journal somehow.

Appeared on Radio Newcastle.

Appeared in an article (and the contents page) of the Journal Culture magazine.

Mostly work, really.

Went to see Thor. Liked it! HAMMER.

Started reading A Song Of Ice And Fire because I'd started watching Game Of Thrones and loved it. The series consumed a large part of my reading this year (they are five very long books!) but were good. My bookshelves thanked me for reading them on a Kindle because there's no way there would have been space for them all otherwise.

Got Foo Fighters' latest album. It was good.

MAY

Took the train down to Cheltenham to see Hugh Laurie in concert. Once in a lifetime experience? Possibly! My very favourite kind of music. His album's good. Stayed with friend who has since moved to Tel Aviv. I miss having her in this country!

Drove to Manchester with my dad for his birthday to see Roger Waters performing The Wall. It was spectacular. 'Comfortably Numb' blew my brains out.

Went to Newcastle the following night to see Rush. Also incredible.

Took sister to Disneyland on the Eurostar. Eurostar is nice. National Express overnight coaches are NOT. Never again. Disneyland remains awesome. I swear it gets more fun the older you get. Quiet time of year too. I want to go again, someone come with me?

Got a tweet from Rory Bremner, who remains the most famous person to have spoken to me on Twitter, although I am now being followed by SAM NEILL (DR ALAN GRANT HIMSELF!!!!), and The Backstreet Boys (yeah, I don't know why either), and have also been tweeted by art critic Waldemar Januszczak-may-have-spelled-that-incorrectly and the director of the film Dean Spanley. Twitter! Woo!

JUNE

Was sent to Darlington of all places to do a talk for work. Still don't really know why. Claimed train ticket on expenses. Talk seemed to go well though.

Went to a gig that went a bit wrong when a friend fainted. Ambulance trip, followed by time in the hospital. Scary. Not good.

Spent a few days in London. Saw lots of shows. Les Miserables (amazing), Phantom (as always), had incredible good luck and got to see Much Ado About Nothing (absolutely hilarious, and it's definitely the greatest romantic comedy of all time), and War Horse (stunning). I did quite well really! Also saw M&Ms World (madness), 'Treasures of Heaven' at the British Museum (astonishing) and went to see the dinosaurs at the Natural History Museum (dinosaurs!). Oh, and spent a day in Oxford with a friend. Never been before; liked it very much indeed. Ashmolean was fascinating, Museum of History of Science cool, Bodleian Library incredible, and it was fantastically sunny the whole time. Oh, and got to catch up with a few friends who've moved down there.

... that was a busy weekend...

The Queen and Prince Philip visited the area. Was put in charge of checking tickets for one of the entry zones. "Red tickets, red tickets here please, red tickets!" Was asked my security to stand by the gates when the Queen and DofE were arriving to make sure nobody got in the way of the car, and as a consequence got THIS CLOSE (arm's length) from them as they arrived. Didn't meet or speak to either but it was really cool to see them in person.

JULY

Finally got to see Stratford-upon-Avon. It is nice. Shakespeare Centre and Birthplace both cool.

Organised staff cinema trip at work to see Deathly Hallows Part 2 (great film). Stressful to sort out but great night. We got special pre-film treatment in an exclusive lounge area, refreshments included in ticket price, etc. Cinema trips have now become a regular monthly/every-other-monthly thing, which is great. It's good to have people at work who are a similar age to me.

Finally got to see Iron Maiden live. That's one ticked off my bands-to-see list...

Sister flew off to Australia. Came back in December, going back again in 2012.

A friend moved to Mexico as well. Hasn't come back yet.

Was given a very scary and important job to do as part of a big event. Involved the most terrifying phone call of my life, a very pressured sort of historical talk, high tea in a State Dining Room with the big fireplace on, with VIPs and everything, as a guest, which was something I don't think I'll get to do again.

Spent a day with friends in Durham.

AUGUST

Almost appeared on 'Flog It', being interviewed about history and such, but didn't make it in because they'd run out of time.

Saw Status Quo. Was fun.

Appeared in Danny, Champion of the World. Really good fun to be an evil gamekeeper, had some good lines and moments, and the audiences were all fantastic (and big). One of my favourite plays to be in, I think. Was described in review as "suitably nasty".

Had to stand with a fire extinguisher by a Civil War cannon while it was set off, just in case it engulfed everything in flames. Learned you don't ever put your fingers in your ears because it compresses the shockwaves of loud noises. You cup your hands over your ears instead, and open your mouth as well, apparently.

Went to quite a few films - Captain America, Super 8, Rise of the Planet of the Apes, Cowboys & Aliens. Liked them all!

Was taken to see The Pitmen Painters for my birthday - excellent play.

SEPTEMBER

Went on a Proper Night Out (I don't do these very often). Had a very, very good time. Sang and performed all nine-and-a-half minutes of 'Bat Out Of Hell' to a friend. Friend is still talking to me, which is very impressive. (I wasn't drunk, incidentally)

Got the part of the Squire in Treasure Island, this year's pantomime. It is loads of fun. I'm enjoying it very much indeed, and am looking forward to getting my costume soon!

Got a daughter along with the part. She's ridiculously good fun - don't know if you're reading this, Penny, but you're awesome!

Learned the word 'thagomizer'. Found new meaning to the word 'corn'.

Jurassic Park re-released in cinemas. Big smiles. Also went on group trip to see Back To The Future which was like a whole new film when you watch it in a cinema. It got applause at the end. Weird, but justified.

First read-throughs, auditions etc for Rumpelstiltskin. Was very relieved, as always, that it went down well - you get so buried in the little details of scripts that you can't remember whether you'd put in a beginning, middle and end, so it's always good to know that it actually makes sense to other people.

Saw The Madness of George III at the shiny new Theatre Royal.

OCTOBER

Went to Cheltenham Literature Festival. As always, very cool, but spent way too much on books. Got to meet and get books signed by Anne Rice, Michael Morpurgo and others, though, heard some really good talks, and had an interesting chat about castles with the guy who has written THE BOOK about castles (it's huge).

Went to An Evening With Terry Pratchett in London. Great experience, got his latest book with the ticket too.

Very busy opening season at work ended! Very busy, but good on the whole (a few problems, some big, some small, aside).

NOVEMBER

Was told I'd be getting more responsibility, money and a new title at work. I've got the first thing, still waiting on the others.

Went to see the local high school do Flint Street Nativity and was blown away by how good they all were. Now wishing I'd changed schools in year 9 so I could have done plays and joined bands and things.

Saw Alter Bridge. Hadn't heard much by them but they were good. Also saw Milton Jones, very funny.

One of my short plays performed for a Variety Night. Went really well, I think. People seemed to like it. MC tripped over our invisible fishing wire afterwards. Typical.

Had a message read out on Radio 2 by Jeremy Vine. It was about cats.

Friend who had moved to Australia came back. Got to see her. Was nice!

Went to see Turner Prize nominees with a friend. They were okay, I correctly predicted the winner.

DECEMBER

Theatre group Christmas party was one of the most enjoyable nights I have had in ages and ages and ages. Cracker hats and dancing and mad balloons and Latin and great company!

Saw the 1931 Dracula at the cinema. Very cool. I do not drink... wine...

Saw Arthur Christmas, which is my new favourite Christmas film. There's always time for a bow.

Christmas! That happened - usually does around this time of year. Was nice.

Appeared, very briefly, on Strictly Come Dancing. Totally famous now.

Rumpelstiltskin performed. Went very well, I thought. People laughed, and enjoyed it. Was nice to watch something I'd written without the stress of having directed it and worrying too much about how it had gone. Very grateful to friends who went to see it.

That was a spectacular failure, I've probably missed loads. And it was less than an hour. I got bored. I am ashamed. What did I miss out?

Oh yeah...

HAPPY 2012 EVERYONE! Let me know your own resolutions and things!

Pantomime: The Blog: The Return (Part 1)

Picture taken from the new Aardman Animation film, The Pirates! In An Adventure With Scientists, which is going to be, judging by the trailer in that link, far funnier than our little pantomime. This is, of course, nothing against the pantomime, which is good, and is funny too, but compare it to Aardman and we are, presently, falling short. But that's okay, because Pirates! is not out until the end of March, and we have until January to add more jokes, and more jokes, and more jokes, and try to compete (we don't have to compete. Only in the sense that Robin the Hood had to compete with True Grit, that sense being, we couldn't at all, they bested us entirely).

If you hadn't surmised from the picture and the paragraph above, this year's pantomime is about pirates. Yarr. It is in fact Treasure Island, loosely (and I mean loosely - I read the book the other week and they are not particularly alike) based on Robert Louis Stevenson's novel of the same name.

I have not written it, I am not directing it, I have no responsibility for it, I am merely in it, and this is why I haven't blogged about it in the same meticulous, compelling and totally-not-tedious-not-even-slightly way as I did last year. However, it's now about six or seven weeks in and I thought I'd share some thoughts. Since a couple of the cast members have joined Twitter (the only place I share the links to these things) since last year's pantomime, I will also have to be more measured in what I say, I think, rather than the free-for-all I had last year where I stressed out occasionally if things had gone wrong at rehearsals.

So if it sounds like I'm moaning and complaining unnecessarily, Barmy Ben, Blind Ali and Penny Penelope Pendragon, I don't mean it, or whatever, okay? Okay.

Anyway, my character is named Squire Pendragon, who I take to be an amalgam of Stevenson's Squire Trelawney and Doctor Livesey, and I have decided - the director had little choice, muahaha - that he will be dressed like Charles II.

A little bit like this Charles II:

But mainly like this Charles II (party, anyone?). I haven't actually talked to any costume or props people yet (I have lots of props I want, from spy-glasses to monocles to snuff-boxes to a rapier), predominantly because I don't know who is in charge of those things. At least, I don't think it's been mentioned...

He's frightfully posh, is Squire Pendragon, what what, and he's loads of fun to play. He has a most wonderful daughter and over the course of rehearsals seems to be developing more and more of a thing for the Dame. Which is allowed, happily, because we have been given carte blanche (how cultured) to add/remove/make changes to/improve the script however we like by the playwright.

Not that it's a bad script - I've read a few pre-written professionally-done pantomime scripts before and this is definitely one of the better ones - but there's a lot that can be done, and what's nice is that those things are being done. Those of the cast who had a hand in writing lots of funny bits last year (and most of the previous years - so there's myself, the Dame, Long John Silver and the actor formerly known as Yee-Haw) are coming up with new gags and lines all the time, and there's a really nice creative atmosphere going on with plenty of "it would be funny if"s...

The director doesn't seem to mind this; that, or he is of the understanding that it's going to happen whether he minds it or not. He has directed pantomimes previously and probably knows that if you get the main bits of the story in, it doesn't really matter what goes on in the scenes and the actors can play about with jokes all they like. In fact, to date he hasn't seemed massively concerned about the dialogue or performances in the scenes themselves - his two big concerns have so far been blocking (telling people where to move and in what order) and cue lines.

Blocking is boring. Especially (speaking from a directorial point of view) when it doesn't work in reality the way you thought it would when you were doing it in your head, and you change it, which annoys the actors, and you change it again, and so on. It's worse for the actors because you just want to get on and say your line.

***Just to follow on from the 'making up new lines' paragraph a bit above, I've just been linked on Facebook to a video of every utterance of "What ho" from Jeeves and Wooster - thank you, Lord W - and am appalled to think that I didn't think of using it for the Squire, so I've just skimmed through my script and identified several points at which I can greet people with a Bertie-esque Wodehouseian "What ho". Huzzah. Which is another word I've added.***

Tangent over, and continuing with blocking. It seems to be taking a very long time, and it also seems to be of paramount importance to the director. Which is different, I think, from how I did it. To be honest, I can't actually remember exactly how I did it - I knew it was important to get people in the right places, but I'm probably a writer first and prefer the verbal to the visual, so it was the lines I liked to focus on. As long as you knew where you were supposed to be and roughly whereabouts you were, and where everyone else was, it was kind of okay and you could get on with it. Of course there are moments to be strict about these sorts of things (cough walkdown cough) but I'd like to think, possibly erroneously, that I was quite happy for people to generally be in the right sort of area. But different don't mean bad, naturally. The better you block, the tighter the performance, so to speak.

It all changes when you get to the theatre anyway - for a start we'll be working with a space twice the size of the one we're using currently.

And cue lines. This is where I may start to get pissy, so Ben, Ali and Penny, look away now. I promise you won't miss anything exciting. Except maybe a bonobo with a thagomizer.

BONOBO WITH A THAGOMIZER.

Right, pissiness ahoy. Cue lines. [At this point I wrote several paragraphs complaining about Bloke, technical people in general, and the fact that my lines, and others', have been fiddled about with to suit the whims of the above, probably not at the preference of the director who I'm sure would have been happy sticking to the script, so I am deleting them, needless to say I am glad I don't have to be in charge of them again this year!]

Music! Can't have a pantomime without music! So we have our scenes, which follow a nice strong story - odd little incongruous scene with a parrot aside, as well as the little puppet who sits on stage throughout the performance but doesn't appear to do anything until halfway through Act 2, prove me wrong, little puppet.

And we have our actors, who are all very good - competing to steal the show this year are:

Jim Hawkins - last year's Robin the Hood, Alnwick's premier principal boy

Penny - my rebellious daughter

The Dame - she always gets the laughs

Captain Mullet - speaking with a Pontius-Pilate-in-Life-of-Brian style 'welease Woger' voice

Blind Ali - last year's Yee-Haw

Two of the three Young Pirates - I can't recall which character is which, but one speaks with an Essex voice and the other in a Welsh accent, both of which are very funny

Long John Silver - naturally

And, hopefully, myself...

The whole cast is pretty good, is what I'm saying.

We have our lines, which are mostly decent-to-good in the script, and those that are not are, week by week, being amended or improved (though not to the degree of unrecognisability).

And we have music. Lots of songs in pantomimes, you see. It's tradition.

I'm not keen on it, myself. I put them in last year because I knew it's What You Do. But I limited it to six songs per act, and I used the X-Factor/Strictly Come Dancing rules of time.

Said rules are, basically, make sure the songs don't last much longer than a minute and a half, because if they do, the audience starts to get bored, loses interest, and changes the channel. Quite condemning of the collective attention spans of the nation, I know, and partly a self-fulfilling prophecy since if you're conditioned to only have to pay attention for 90 seconds then of course you're going to lose interest after that time. But it's what they do, and I think, generally, it's something worth adhering to.

(This may be partly because I quite often get bored watching songs in pantomimes where I'm in the audience, usually if I don't like the song, rather than as a detriment to the performers.)

So, with a couple of exceptions, I tried to stick by that rule. However, that's gone out of the window this year. They're pretty much the full songs. That's probably my main worry this year... if the audience starts to drift off and get bored halfway through most of the songs, it may negatively affect the rest of the show as well. I could be wrong, but speaking as an audience member, I would get bored (apart from in the first song, which is another Thin Lizzy number, woo).

BUT, it's not my decision, and it's not my problem, I don't have to worry about music or Bloke or people not turning up (did I mention that the HR Manager from work is in it this year? Weird) or rehearsals starting late or any of that, and all I gots to do is remember where I'm going and what I'm saying and when to do both. And that's fine by me.

I hope you'll all come and see it, because it should be a good show. With pirates!

Corn.

Tradition, Technology, Technology, Tradition, Superstition?

If that 'embed' worked, above you should be a YouTube video featuring Metallica's song 'For Whom The Bell Tolls'. With lyrics, that I don't dare look at, because knowing the words would spoil it somehow. This becomes relevant in a bit; it's my shabby excuse for writing a blog. If that's the bit you'd like to read, and I recommend skipping because I do my usual self-indulgent tedious twaddle up to that point, scroll down until you see the column of asterisks and the notice 'DID YOU SKIP?' You'll be safe after that.

So, tradition, technology, technology, tradition, superstition?

Technology: I put that in the title because I was going to write this on an iPad and it was gonna be all, ooh, check me out, I'm blogging on an iPad, I AM THE FUTURE. 'cept it wasn't, and I didn't, and I'm not. Didn't work, don't know why. I managed to write the title fine, but it didn't want to recognise the 'put all the writing here' box, so I switched to the laptop, because that's just how much I wanted to blog tonight. Lots, that's how much.

The subtext of the above paragraph is, not meaning to sound like a look-shiny-new-gadget type, I have an iPad. I kind of like it. Never saw myself as wanting one, but it's dead handy for just popping on and using the internet/Twitter/email with. Haven't explored apps much beyond things like iPlayer.

Since my last blog, which may or may not have been a while ago, Technology: the Kindle's definitely become an indispensable. It's been a bloody lifesaver while I've been reading A Song of Ice and Fire (starting Book 5 tonight!) - the ability to instantly download the next book in the series after you finish the last one is fantastic. It's not for every book, though. Not at all. The new Terry Pratchett is out in October, as is the third and final book in the Strain trilogy (best of the many, many 21st century vampire novels) and they are both things you need to read with the physical book in your hand. Likewise, you can't read a David Gibbins novel unless it's a paperback, preferably second-hand with a few creases in the spine.

Mind, my friend John would argue you just can't read a David Gibbins novel, but I love them.

And finally, you can't take a Kindle to book signings, which is, hopefully, what I might be attending at this year's Cheltenham Literary Festival...

... which might well have become an annual Tradition: this year will be pretty different because my friend in Cheltenham only went and moved to Tel Aviv (it's so far away, I miss her!) so I have the option of either staying with the grandmother (fraught with dangers, I have to admit) or hotelling it (moneymoneymoneymoneymoney). However, I reckon the things I've booked to see (with the aforementioned book signings a possibility/bloody-better-be-probability after each) will be worth it:

Christopher Lee & Harriet Walter. Okay, the Harriet Walter I can give or take, but Christopher Lee!

Michael Morpurgo talking about War Horse and how it's moved from book to play to film.

John Landis - he directed The Blues Brothers and Three Amigos! fer crying out loud!

See? I try not to brag about technological gadgetry, but I can't fucking resist the "you'll never guess who I'm going to see" tangent. I apologise.

Honestly, I do. But if I can't brag to my blog, who can I brag to? There's nobody who'd tolerate it in person.

Tradition: I wish I had somebody who'd tolerate me in person! Yes, it's another one of those maudlin bits that double up as an excuse to reference Scott Pilgrim.

Has it been a while since the last one? Maudlin bit or Pilgrim reference? Can't remember. Anyway. I've been single for two years now - two years, mad mad mad. - and [boring self-pity and plea for self-confidence/knowledge of how girls think deleted]. Yeah, anyway, thought you'd like to know that.

At least I've refrained from Springsteen lyrics or references to Anna Kendrick tonight, so I haven't hit every cliche checkmark yet.

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DID YOU SKIP?

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Hi there. Did you skip, incidentally? If you didn't, sorry again. To be fair, you knew what you'd be reading when you clicked onto the blog, especially if you're one of those who's read this thing more than once. Nobody but yourselves etc.

Whether you skipped or not, though, here's my tradition. Superstition, really, but it's like a tradition as well. Are the two interchangeable? Semantics!

The sharing of the story is inspired by my having been in a production of Danny, Champion of the World last week. The play went really well, the audiences seemed to enjoy it, and it was loads of fun to be in - possibly the most fun I've had acting in a play in Alnwick so far.

I made sure, before every performance, to keep strictly to my pre-play tradition, which I established in May 2009, and have kept up for approximately half a dozen productions encompassing around 25/26 performances to date. The superstition element comes into play because the only production for which I didn't adhere to the tradition resulted in, among other things, me getting cheated on, getting swine flu, and getting dumped, so I'm a little bit reluctant to stop.

Okay, granted, you can't get cheated on or dumped if you're single.

Okay, and maybe it was all coincidence.

BUT WHAT IF IT WASN'T

The performances of that play weren't great or that enjoyable either, so, I keep to the tradition, which is as follows. It's kind of obsessive, but this is what happens to traditions over time - once they become established all kinds of new, extra rules come into being:

As I drive into the town of Alnwick*, right as I pass the 'welcome to Alnwick' sign, I have to play 'For Whom The Bell Tolls' by Metallica on my car CD player. Preferably on volume 34 but this is negotiable on weather conditions and so on. Drumming along on the steering wheel is optional, but sometimes it helps you get into the performance mood. The song should play until the line 'Take a look to the sky, just before you die, it's the last time he will' - and if it has been timed correctly, this moment will coincide exactly with the car pulling into a suitable car parking space** in the first car park behind the Playhouse, where the performance takes place. If the song has been put on at the correct time, and barring bad traffic on the way into the town, this usually works out to within a couple of seconds. The song has to be turned off after that line, absolutely no earlier or later. There is a very specific moment to switch the engine off (it comes at about 3:31 in the video at the top). If all - or most - of the above is not kept to, then everything could go wrong.

It's STUPID. Absolutely STUPID. I know that. But it seems to work!

This is the point where, if my blog had any popularity, I'd say 'tweet me your similarly mad superstitions and how they work for you'...

Thanks for reading, anyhow. It's panto season again in a couple of weeks' time, and although I've written one for one group, and am going to attempting to get a part in another, I have no actual responsibility for either this year. So no panto blog this year - I'll have to find another hook to produce regular blogging from.

Maybe I'll join a gym.

Hahahahahahahahahahahahaha.

No seriously, I probably should.

'til then!

Dan

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*there are exceptions to this part of the tradition. If I am already in Alnwick, I must either estimate the distance to get to the car park, or, if I am already in the car park, I can keep to tradition while stationary. If the performance is not in Alnwick - only one occasion so far in which this was the case, Berwick, June 2010 - then similar rules can be adhered to depending on parking and how well I know the area.

**there is one in particular that seems to work really well, but there shouldn't be disaster or anything if that specific space is unavailable on any occasion.

3D: Brief and Sweary

Yeah, whatever, Shrek. I'm just not that impressed anymore.

I have no idea whether On Stranger Tides was any good or not because it was absolutely ruined for me by the 3D. Dreadful to the point where after half an hour of failing to tolerate it I just took the glasses off and put up with some slight blurring for the rest of the film. Adds depth? Fuck off, it sucks you right out of any ability to get into the film. I can barely remember anything that happened in that first part of Tides - all I know is that there were some bits that looked like they were in front of other bits.

Others I know have had the same experiences with other films - Voyage of the Dawntreader (which I haven't seen) and Thor (which I have) being two recent examples. I can't speak for Dawntreader, but Thor is one of my favourite films of the year so far, I loved it. But apparently the 3D destroyed any enjoyment of that as well.

I'm giving up on them. Unless they're some kind of super-special-ultra-made-for-3D type film like Avatar, or a fully animated thing where the 3D doesn't add anything but doesn't hurt either (like Up), I'm sticking to 'also available in 2D'.

There are other exceptions - Tron Legacy was great fun in 3D, because it was mega-all-CG-lightcycle-craziness, and it makes sense that The Grid would be 3D. What I respected about Tron is that for all the bits that took place in the real world, they kept it 2D. Only in The Grid did they add the extra dimension. There are certain types of films that work well with it - the new Transformers looks to be one of these (I thought Burton's Alice in Wonderland was too, but I appear to have been in the minority there). BUT IT DOESN'T WORK WITH EVERY FILM. It doesn't even work all the way through every film. At least 80% of Pirates should have been kept 2D (and, if watching without glasses was anything to go by, basically was anyway), and the 'real' bits of Tron would have been appalling if they were in 3D too.

But I have a feeling I'm wrong. Because 'also available in 2D' is slowly disappearing. In order to see Thor in 2D, my mates and I had to go at about 10.15 on a Saturday morning. For Pirates, we couldn't find a 2D showing outside of working hours. And it's only going to get harder. I know that 3D's sticking around - not just because of the extra money you can charge, and because of anti-piracy blah blah shit shit, but because people are ACTUALLY GOING TO THE FUCKING THINGS. I can't imagine this is entirely out of choice - surely by now enough people have seen enough 3D films to know the majority of them look shit and take away from enjoyment of the film. The novelty factor has well and truly gone, too. But if you go to the cinema, and the only showings you can see for your film of choice are 3D, of course you're going to do that, because you won't see your film otherwise.

James Cameron's claiming everything will be 3D in five years. I fucking hope not, is all I'm saying, but I have a feeling he'll be right. Watching Paul Merton's Birth of Hollywood(which I'd really recommend catching, except they took it off iPlayer this morning), in the third episode he talked about the advent of talking pictures. Did people have the same negative reaction to talkies in the 20s that I'm having with 3D? Those people must have eventually got used to them, and realised that from then on, every film was going to have sound in it... should I just shut up and do the same? I'm desperate to see the last Harry Potter film, and I'd love to see it on a massive IMAX screen, but I know that any and all IMAX showings will be in 3D, and I really, really don't want my enjoyment of the film to be ruined like it was with Pirates because of crappy 3D. So I'll scour the listings for 'also available in 2D', but sooner rather than later, even that might not be an option...

Is 3D really the future, and I'm just wrong? Help me out here.

Geek

How much of a geek am I? Let me count the ways:

1) I'm writing a blog.

2) I'm writing a blog about how much of a geek I am.

3) I'm watching a Harry Potter film while I write the blog.

4) I like the Harry Potter films, and the books, and have read/watched them multiple times.

5) My big plans for going to London next weekend involve musicals, theatre, stately homes and museums.

6) I like museums. And art. But not modern art.

7) I like theatre.

8) I'm involved in amateur dramatics.

9) I write.

10) I'm not very good at writing, really, and haven't done much of it for ages, yet I say things like 'I write'.

11) I'm too self-deprecating for my own good.

12) I haven't been in a relationship since the Big Ex dumped me.

13) That was ages ago.

14) See 11.

15) I don't like nightclubs. They are loud and they are sticky, and if I go out, I'm going out to socialise with people, and I can't do that in a loud, sticky place.

16) I have a PS3. I play it online sometimes. Not often, though, and I've only ever played Call of Duty once. I was rubbish at it.

17) My way of speaking is that of a right geek.

18) I think history is brilliant.

19) I think Shakespeare is even more brilliant.

20) I've read almost every novel Sir Terry Pratchett's written.

21) I wrote my dissertation on vampires.

22) Three years after the fact and I'm still talking about my dissertation.

23) I watched and theorised in depth about LOST right up to the bitter end.

24) I've almost got the original Star Wars film off by heart.

25) I own at least two Star Wars t-shirts.

26) I go to the cinema multiple times for the same film if it's one I like.

27) I've got at least a dozen things I could write down related exclusively to Star Wars. Do you remember that old Facebook group 'Automatic doors make me feel like a Jedi'? Yeah, that's me.

28) I collected action figures. Namely Star Wars, Buffy and Lord of the Rings.

29) They currently live in a display cabinet.

30) My favourite films include Lord of the Rings, Jurassic Park and Scott Pilgrim vs. the World.

31) I have never related to a book more than when I read Scott Pilgrim for the first time. HE IS ME.

32) I love classic rock music.

33) I go to classic rock gigs, and am regularly the youngest person there by a couple of decades.

34) Just this morning I bought a ticket to see The Darkness. I don't even expect it'll be that good.

35) I did my MA in Creative Writing. It has not yet come in very useful.

36) I'm quite happy to go to the cinema alone, but I've gone right off 3D.

37) When I learn something new or discover a new song/programme/whatever, I feel the need to share it despite knowing that nobody else will be that interested. By the way, have you seen Horrible Histories? It's amazing!

38) I have no sense of fashion. Nor can I dance. I can't run well.

39) I wear glasses. That's kind of an obvious one, I suppose.

40) There's a couple of things I'm interested in that are so geeky I'm too ashamed to even mention them here.

I'm going to stop now. 40 is worrying enough without knowing I could probably continue for quite a while longer.

Big Gig Blog: Bigiglog

I write in the midst of my busiest gig month for quite some time.

I used to go to see a lot of bands live. Some were new and modern, most were classic rock bands form the seventies who I went to see because (a) I love that stuff and (2) you never know when the last tour might be the last tour, so you've got to take the opportunity when you can.

Then I stopped. I think it was partly graduation and moving home again after years of convenient distance to bands that were playing (though strangely, these days I'm just as likely to hop on a train for a few hours than I am to drive to Newcastle - in the next few weeks alone I've had or got gigs in Cheltenham, Manchester, Edinburgh and Newcastle). Mostly it was The Ex.

She didn't really like live music. She wasn't really keen on me going to it that often. So I didn't. I didn't miss anything major (Metallica aside) and I did go to things occasionally. Took her to Springsteen in Hyde Park. SUPERB gig. She wasn't that fussed. Alas.

The past couple of years have been a mix of both the above scenarios: I have times where gigs are happening all over the shop, followed by lean periods where there's bugger all for months. I've just completed five months of the latter and am emering into the former.

The last gig I went to before this month must have been Meat Loaf in December. (it was good). December, worryingly for a number of reasons, was a while ago.

May - August looked/looks like this:

May 2 - Hugh Laurie

May 20 (THAT'S TOMORROW ZOMG EXCITED) - Roger Waters

May 21 (THAT'S IN TWO DAYS DOUBLE ZOMG) - Rush

May 28 - Iggy Pop / Evolution Festival (I bought a ticket purely for Iggy, but I hear good things about Two Door Cinema Club, and Billy Bragg is on one of the other stages I believe?)

June 9 - Brian Wright / Jim Bianco - does anyone know where to buy tickets for Head of Steam in Newcastle, incidentally? I don't have tickets for this yet.

June 10 - Brian Wright / Jim Bianco again - Edinburgh this time

July sometime - Iron Maiden and Airbourne

August 20 - Status Quo and 10CC.

Then a whole lot of nothing again.

Hence my title of Big Gig Blog - a bigiglog for a big gig month.

Hugh Laurie, by the way, was incredible. Not just because THAT'S HUGH LAURIE, I'M LIKE TEN FEET AWAY FROM FRICKIN' HOUSE, but because he loves the music I love. Not seventies classic rock, either; the music I love even more than that - the blues. The blues / rhythm and blues / whatever you want to call it got me properly into music for the first time, and it's still my favourite genre of all. Played well, your foot taps, your hands clap, your head nods, and your eyes close in ecstasy - it's you and the music and nothing else. Hugh Laurie and his band played flawlessly. Great stuff.

Roger Waters and Rush are this weekend - the ULTIMATE PROG WEEKEND! Waters is performing The Wall with a full stage show, so it should be spectacular. Rush are playing for over 3 hours, including 'Moving Pictures' in full. They've been near the top of my Must See list for years so I'm absolutely thrilled to be getting the chance. (Iron Maiden are top of that list, but that'll all change in July!)

Iggy Pop - well, The Stooges - also feature very high on that list, hence my Evolution purchase despite not being that fussed about anyone else on the bill. Sadly it's not the real Stooges since Ron Asheton is no longer with us, but that's the danger of liking bands who were big forty years ago.

A lot of brilliant memories have come from gigs I've been to. I might do another blog some time with some of my favourites, like:

- Nickelback (yes, really)

- The Darkness (yes, really, again)

- The Datsuns

- Journey

- The Who

- Foo Fighters

- Eagles of Death Metal

- Bruce Springsteen (both times)

- Aerosmith (both times)

- The Hotel Cafe Tour (both times)

- Paul McCartney

- Tiffany Page

AND MORE.

I bet you're already salivating.

Hahahahahahahahahahahahaha

(NB: I aplogise for the poor, shoddy quality of this blog. I just felt I needed to write one. It's been a while. I'll do better next time, promise.)

Long time, no blog

Forgive me, bored reader desperately in search of last-resort procrastination, for I have sinned.

And how long has it been since your last blog?

Over a month?

That's quite a long time. Why did you stop?

I ... am not sure. Just never got round to doing it. I suppose I've been using a computer at work a lot and by the time the evening rolled round I was starting to tire of the screens, and my eyes were alternately wailing and muttering cantankerously under their breath.

So what made you decide to write one again?

Well, I'd been considering it on and off for a little while, but really it was ... oh, who am I kidding. It was her again.

Damn you, Anna Kendrick. I was reading the live blog of the 2011 Empire Awards, and she was there with the Scott Pilgrim director Edgar Wright. ZOMG, I thought. (I've been using "ZOMG" to express mild surprise for about two weeks now and I really have to stop because I've become one of those people that (i) says "ZOMG" and (ii) pronounces it "zomg". Someone hit me. Not hard, mind, but forcibly enough to make me realise it is not big, nor is it clever, nor is it conducive to success romantically, personally, socially or any other-ally)

Anyway, ZOMG, I thought. She's here. In the UK. Might this be fate? Might she be making a film in London, and I happen to go to London at some point in the near future -

- not to try and accidentally bump into Anna Kendrick, you understand, I genuinely want to go to London again soon. I really want to visit Apsley House because I just finished reading To War With Wellington by Peter Snow and feel that visiting Wellington's house would be a good thing. There's a new special exhibition at the Natural History Museum called 'Age of the Dinosaurs' which will surely be amazing. And my Oldest Friend has expressed a desire to go and see Phantom of the Opera which is clearly an extremely good excuse for me to go and see it again. Oh, and is War Horse still playing, because that too. I continue to hold out on London swallowing me up as a resident, but it's a bloody good place to visit as a tourist -

- and we might-just-might accidentally bump to each other, and exchange a look - hers will say "idiot" and mine will say "ZOMG" - before she clicks and realises this is the person she dreamed about TWO NIGHTS IN A ROW last summer, and blah blah blah whirlwind romance 'Daniel is in a relationship' etc etc etc. Fate. Right?

No. Not fucking right.

Turns out she's in the UK with Scott Pilgrim director Edgar Wright because they're a couple.

Nooooo

I feel jilted, dejected, heartbroken. Crushed.

(I'm joking)

Not only have I lost you, Anna, but I might never be able to watch his films the same way again.

(still half-joking)

So I'll not be writing about her anymore.

(serious now)

I'll wait for the cheering to subside.

And the murmurs about how pathologically weird I am.

Any time now.

Okay, please stop. I'm being light-hearted. I don't really think that ... oh, never mind. Moving on.

Right, so, what's happened since my last blog in mid-February?

Fuck all, if I'm honest. Now there's a reason to keep reading!

No, seriously, please keep reading.

Since the panto ended, the focus has been on work. I'd love to go into detail about what's going on at work, recent developments and so on, but the Thing I Gave Up For Lent was "Complaining about work" and if I start writing about work, I'm pretty certain I'd wouldn't be able to finish doing so without breaking the Lenten vow. So... work definitely... exists. Yep.

Thanks for still reading after "Fuck all, if I'm honest". Knew you would.

We did have the Director of the National Gallery come to talk about the art on Friday, which was a neat little privilege. And a world ceramics expert from Bonhams to talk about the porcelain (which is, believe it or not, more interesting that you'd suspect). That was cool.

Ah! The wedding. I can talk about the wedding.

A pretty major perk of working where I work are the staff parties. To say they're spectacular is an understatement, especially in this case. I was lucky enough (or so I thought) to receive an invite to a staff party to celebrate a wedding for February. The way these parties usually work is that you have to have been employed for a certain amount of time in order to receive an invite.

So I thought that this would mean all the managers from the previous year (all with less than 12 months employment under their belts - I'm one of the longest serving of the lot of them, which is an odd feeling since I'M TWENTY THREE) would not receive invites.

Not so.

I then feared that because they don't really grasp the coolness of working where we work, the scale of it, the history of it, and probably wouldn't even recognise or know who the people getting married or their family members even were, they wouldn't appreciate the invite to the party, they wouldn't appreciate the party itself, and would act accordingly.

Unfortunately, they did. Not good.

But luckily, the party itself was incredible enough that this barely even mattered. The venue was UNBELIEVABLE. For three weeks previously, a colossal marquee was being set up in the grounds. On the inside was a forest. They'd turned it into a forest. With candles and lights hanging from the branches of all the trees. A dancefloor built in at a lower level. A starry ceiling. I can't convey how stunning it all looked. I tried to take some photos and they didn't even begin to demonstrate how vast, and beautiful, and, well, posh it all was.

And there were caricaturists, and free booze (though I was driving, the non-alcoholic alternatives were free too), and a three course meal, and loads of fireworks, and it was agreed that it's worth putting up with all the crap and the bullshit and the politics for perks like this.

And it is.

I bought a very, very nice suit for the occasion. Savoy Tailors Guild, you know. Waistcoat and everything. I need more reasons to wear it. Any offers? I actually thought I looked quite good in it, if that's an incentive. It is an ambition for someone, one day, to call me 'dashing' (good word).

And that's work. I'll be free to talk about it properly after Easter.

What else.

I got my first credit card. Haven't used it yet.

I'm fully converted to Kindle now. Have read several books on it. The most recent was One Day by David Nicholls, which was something I would probably never have picked up in book form. And I loved it! Highly recommend it. Only about £3.99 on Amazon for the paperback. Or if you also have a Kindle, get the sample. I think you'll like it, and I'd hope you then sprung for the full book.

Not too sure about the casting for the film. The choice for Dexter is reasonable, but their Emma is just wrong. She's not Emma. No way. And she'd better not be American in the film.

I've now seen 7 of the 10 Best Picture Oscar nominees for this year. The Social Network should have won the Oscar. I loved True Grit but don't mind it not winning anything. Black Swan was a lot better than I was expecting; ditto 127 Hours. Inception and Toy Story 3 were ages ago now, and The King's Speech was a 'good' for Colin Firth winning, a 'fair enough then' for Best Picture, but shouldn't have been anywhere near Best Director. Or is it an unwritten rule that you've got to have the Picture/Director Oscars go to the same film?

It's my dad's birthday on Thursday. NO IDEA WHAT TO GET HIM HELP PLEASE HELP HELP.

I haven't done much socialising in the last month. I can lay blame on various factors - most things happen on a work night, and are far enough away that it'll turn into a really late night which is not great on a work night, and yes, I've become one of those people who doesn't do anything late on a work night, and I don't like it - but there's no excuse. I need to meet people, I need to think, 'sod it, I'll drive to Newcastle and drive back in the early hours in order to be at work for 9'. I need someone to give me a lift there and back if possible...

I got tickets to see Hugh Laurie at the Cheltenham Jazz Festival in May. So I'll have seen Fry AND Laurie at Cheltenham Town Hall, within the space of a year. Soupy twist.

Still haven't shifted my spare ticket for The Wall. May 20th (a Friday), Manchester, anyone?

Sister's going to Australia for four months in July. Weird.

I still want to go to Canada (Toronto), but I don't want to go alone. Ditto Rome. Ditto Venice. Ditto Dublin. Ditto, well, almost anywhere, really. Anyone want to go to any of the above?

I was asked to write/direct my village pantomime this upcoming year. Oh SHITNOTANOTHERONE, I thought. I whittled them down to just writing (and a credit as Executive Creative Consultant, because I'll find it funny if that's in the programme). Gonna have a go at a fast-and-loose adap of Rumpelstiltskin. And it'll have to be on a much smaller scale than the last one because we're talking village hall rather than auditorium. This was the real reason why I turned on the computer tonight. I wasn't intending to blog. I was meaning to start on a first draft. Best laid plans etc.

The secretary of my main theatre group resigned last week. She was going to be the one tasked with topping my pantomime with (I think it was going to be) Ali Baba next January. No more. The rumour mill says someone may do Treasure Island. Awesome, say I. I want to be a pirate.

Speaking of pirates, seen the new trailer for Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides? Call me hopeful, but it could be pretty good. Also, Captain America. And Super 8.

And ... I've run out of things to say. I'm a dull fucker, aren't I.

See ya next blog.

(which may or may not be another month away)

(always good to end on parenthesis)

(and sorry for all that Anna Kendrick stuff, if I didn't go back up to the top after pressing 'PUBLISH POST' and delete it all.)

(How are you, by the way? I haven't asked. Tweet me @danielthew)