Horizontal Rain and Environmental Aspirations, Northern Ireland

Cabin fever bit viciously deep this morning.  Allied to rampant desire to do environmental good, it sent Anthony and I out into the teeth of a Northern Ireland gale.  We thought it was time to recycle the mountain of bottles that was threatening to engulf us every time we opened the garage door.  We thought it would be a bit pointless to load the bottles into the car when we could load them onto the bicycles.  We thought the wind didn't really look that strong. We thought it might be a good idea to test the attractive plastic pants I'd recently bought Anthony in an effort to ensure no other woman ever looked at him again.

Ten minutes later I found myself peddling furiously into the teeth of horizontal rain, trying to control the bicycle with one hand and keep my hood, hat and specs on with the other, as the wind lifted me bodily off the road and flung me about, only to land with a clash of 100 empty wine bottles. Soaked to the skin, my wet frozen trousers serving no purpose other than protecting passers-by from the necessity of seeing me cycling in just my socks (which probably would have been warmer) I do not give up. We forge onwards in the direction of the bottle bank. I loose Anthony to the gale.

Wind. Can't breath. Can't see. Water. Can't feel skin on thighs. Can't feel thighs. Boots wet. Water down the back of my neck. Gloves wet. Am trying to cycle down hill.  Peddling like mad because the wind has temporarily conquered gravity.

Feel extremely green.  Find Anthony at the green glass. A looming outline in the swirling weather struggling forward to deliver the empty Stella bottles to the waiting mouth of the bottle bank. Manage to get a few peanut butter jars into the clear glass bank, peering around through rain spattered spectacles, secretly glad no one is about to see just how many bottles we're dispatching.

 In goes the last Gordon's gin bottle and the wind takes me half on my bike.  I catch a glimpse of Anthony as the wind hurls me up Abbey Street.  I've lost him now.  Can't stop.  I may end up in the Irish sea if I'm not careful.  I make it home in less than half the time it took to get into town.  Anthony blows into the court yard too, and hanging on to the door knob for dear life we throw the bicycles and ourselves into the front hall, and stand there dripping. Feel very green, but notice in the hall mirror that our lips have decided to go blue instead.

Worms? Yes, Worms.

Mmm.  Worms.  Found myself saying something I never thought I would.  Today.  In a moment of excitement shouted out over brunch to an audience of two writers, a composer and a graphic novelist: "Oh! I forgot to say!  I have worms now!!  Do you want to see my worms?!?"  Stunned silence.  Can we blame them?  Worms?  Ewwww.

 But yes, ordered, received and assembled my first wormery last week.  You have to leave them be for 7 days with only a head of lettuce and some newspaper to allow them to acclimatise. Mine certainly did.  This morning they were hammering at the garage door demanding frothy latte.  Forced them back into their bin by poking at them with little bits of rolled up Guardian.

But apparently nothing will smell. All household waste, including last year's inexplicably pointy boots and that unfortunate over mantel ornament auntie Sheila gave me will soon be made into sweet-smelling-forest-floor compost fit to shake hands with Desmond Tutu.  It's all very exciting.  We're bonding.  I can see myself shopping for the worms soon: "No no darling, you know they prefer organic radicchio to curly kale!"

All self-respecting artists are having a worm experience now, you know. 

Artists Die But Box Office Lives

Woke up this morning clutching the duvet after a nightmare in which nameless terrorists had swarmed into my former theatre determined to kill all Artists but quite happy to let the Box Office staff survive.  And now that I remember, they were also after people who wore colourful belts....

Hmm.  I can see the platform I was about to build for a psychological examination of the danger that Artists present to society as perceived in my subconscious is getting a little shaky.  The DANGER of Artists-and-tasselled-belt-wearers just doesn't have quite the same ring.  And now that I remember, the terrorists were all quite brightly dressed in tasty pink, pale yellow and blue.  Very well pressed too.

But, but, they definitely DID want to kill all the Artists.  I only managed to survive because I remembered to say, at the last minute: "I don't work here any more!!!"... and because my tassels were on the small side.

 And why were Box Office spared anyway?  Better customer service skills?? If Artists were all eradicated what were they going to sell tickets too???

 I have noticed that since leaving full-time venue management three weeks ago, my Artist's brain is taking up a lot more space than it used to, squeezing administration back into the corners.  It feels like watching time-lapse photography of jungle vines growing at top speed all over crisply outlined rectangular temples somewhere in Mexico. Working out how to balance the time given to each is going to be an interesting challenge.  I seem to need a clear break between using the left and right sides of my brain.  Sleep works, or a nice meal.  Hmm now that I think of it, there's some left-over pizza from last night in the fridge downstairs...

A bit more rehearsal with Nuala

David Hull just phoned to say that they've negotiated with the Opera House for a large poster for Out of the Box right at the new entrance.  What a relief that we actually put in effort to get proper posters designed after all!  Although now that it is  really happening we'd better make sure the show is polished.  (momentary stage fright)  Nuala and I have just booked a bit more rehearsal on the Thursday and Friday before the Belfast opening.  The day after my mother arrives in Northern Ireland.  Always a good time to pick!  Nothing too intense (I saw the show in Cookstown and it was in good shape, and 14 months after the show opened, Nuala's still  nailing the comedy beautifully) but a little bit of a chance to revisit some of the physical moves together.  They're always the hardest to hold onto in a one person show.  No one else is there on-stage with you to keep you right.  I'm not sure people know what a natural Nuala is...  I'm not sure she knows herself.

I can see us spending a fair amount of our rehearsal time sitting down talking to the Oven Mitts and making sure they still have individual personalities.  The quality of their mouth movements when they talk has always been important for me.  And how they take disappointment.  I'm reaching for perfection: a Kermitesque collapse in the face of the cruel injustices of the Universe.  Does anyone remember how his nose used to wrinkle?  A Kermit nose wrinkle - something worth striving for.

Lyric Theatre - What's Their Role?

I had a meeting on Monday with the Cathedral Arts Quarter Festival Director Sean Kelly on Monday, and listening to him briefly describe where he thought his Festival sat in terms of its brand, content and audience got me thinking about other Northern Irish theatre brands, including the Lyric.  It seems to be there's a tough job to be done there in terms of carving out a niche.  The Lyric has to bridge both the preserving, conserving impulse of the classical theatre and the investigating exploring impulse of the new theatre.

 I decided that I'd like to see the Lyric defining its identity (programme/choices/etc) by asking and answering three questions from our perspective in Northern Ireland in 2006:

1. what is classic theatre?
   
2. why bother?
3. what is cutting edge or just breaking now that will be the classics of tomorrow?