Manchester Direction

Yesterday I crossed the Yorkshire border. There was snow on the Pennines. Except when it comes to cricket, I always consider myself a bit of an honary Mancunian, having been a student there. There's a pride about Manchester, and why not?

I was attending a directing workshop at Contact Theatre by Mark Rosenblatt and Orla O'Loughlin, both young JMK award talents, who've worked at good theatres. I went along more to inform my writing, which it did. It also made me realise how hard and unglamourous it can be to work as an actor or director. We spent several hours in a black box studio theatre with no daylight. I think I'd get SAD having to do that too often. As Irene, whom I'm working with at the moment said, 'Welcome to the real world of acting'.

Met some interesting people, such as Szilvi Naray-Davey (who's in 'Fencing for Losers' at the Lowry 29th-31st Jan, if anyone's over that way).

Came back and my lovely daughter was home (well, she was really out on the town most of the night, but popped by to eat). Lots of rain today. To be honest, I love rain, but it comes back to too much of a good thing, especially if you're in York a lot (always flooding) - or poor Cumbria just now.

Thurs 26th Nov

Yesterday was a fairly good day - though busy. Had productive meeting with Students' Union (they didn't boo or pelt me with anything), plus went to the ALCS (Authors Licensing and Collecting Society) AGM, which for the first time in its 30 year life, met outside London. Did it get a culture shock? Well, it was in the Merchant Adventurers Hall, a medieval guildhall in York, very old, distinguished and atmospheric (if not all that adventurous). We were treated to an inspiring address by Joanne Harris - she of the 'Chocolat' fame.
Then I went to a college event, where a very interesting talk was given on Sidney Smith, the Georgian wit most famed for fantasising that heaven was eating pate de foix gras whilst trumpets played, or something along those lines. I think the trumpets could be hell though, and you can always have too much of a good thing.(Apologies for any typos/spelling errors - can't find any spell checker on this thing)

Onlined out

In the past 48hours, have joined Facebook, become a tweeter and now a blog. Yes, all ages after the rest of the world and his/her dog.