Thursday, 31 March 2022
Temporary stall
Wednesday, 30 March 2022
broadside
Saturday, 19 March 2022
Rachel Parris live at the Northcott
An excellent evening yesterday, as we resumed old habits and zipped along to the theatre to see Rachel Parris performing her stand-up show.
The advantages of living in a smaller city were all too apparent to us, taking only ten minutes to get to the Uni where the the gig was booked, easy parking and an uncrowded bar.
Then to the show, which opened with Parris singing a song about those in the audience who had been brought along, only knew her from the Mash Report and so on. It took me a moment to adjust to the fact that she sings, and plays piano rather well. "Classically trained" as she put it, with a virtuoso run along the keys.
The show was densely packed with anecdotes and home truths, which invariably included references to Covid and the government, but stopped short of anything involving the most recent events.
It was all well-observed and funny, and Parris worked the audience for the extra laughs.
She described how she had become well-known, not directly from the television Mash Report, but from the repeated posting of funny clips on social media. She described the day when the retweets and watches were pinging her phone every second.
The Northcott was packed and with a good mix of audience types. Parris described her last gig in Lichfield where she said a couple of people walked out, but there were no such scenes for this show, which still taunted the same rogues.
There was also a section where she dealt with mental heath revealing that she had suffered badly after a year of what should have been pleasant turmoil.
From not knowing much about her, by the end of the show, I felt that she had revealed a considerable amount, and entertained in the process.
Wednesday, 9 March 2022
aromatic
Wednesday, 2 March 2022
ignoble : a corrupt and sleazy compendium
Tuesday, 1 March 2022
Sleaze: Beep-beep, Beep-beep, Yeah
Well, here we go with Sleaze, the follow up book to Corrupt. In Corrupt, we saw an orchestrated plan to manipulate MPs through the lobbying system. Some were more susceptible than others to what was a clandestine scheme. This new novel speculates about politics, the car industry, global business, money laundering and the effects of big business upon Members of Parliament. It can get very messy. Click on the cover for more information.
Wednesday, 23 February 2022
Raven's Card
Wednesday, 9 February 2022
Tuesday, 8 February 2022
money to burn?
My old energy bill was about £1200, and my new price could be one of the following:
Sunday, 6 February 2022
Zwifting up Mont Ventoux
Tuesday, 1 February 2022
scarlet beast with seven heads and ten horns
Wednesday, 26 January 2022
Flan B and expect a circus
I used to work in Turkey, but I don't remember the 'when a clown moves into a palace he doesn't become a king, instead the palace becomes a circus' proverb, however convenient in the current circumstances. I do remember 'Elect a clown, expect a circus,' however.