FOURTEEN

Monday 2nd September 2019

Did a ‘What’s He Building In There?’-style prose piece and posted it online immediately after morning pages. Good response. Had a great little writing half marathon in Waddington Street Centre this afternoon. Got through all thirteen prompts. Pleased to get Poetry Jam posters up. Bus to Bensham. Picked up clothes. Watched the news. Nice ride home on the 49/A and the X45 to Consett. Got doughnuts in Tesco for 20p. Online chat with Jenni: “I’m still in Bingley. 3 meals a day. Baccy. All paid for. Last night I had my tea with Echo and the Bunnymen – fucking mint!” Made me laugh out loud. 11.30 pm.

Tuesday 3rd September 2019

Morning pages included fictional inheritance failures. Trimmed edges of Anomalies pages. Listened again to Spirit by Depeche Mode. Chicken curry and grilled potato slices for tea. Good to go with two 20-minute sets for my guest appearance at Featherstone Centre of Britain Slam. Started preparing for the autumn college course. Nothing concrete but various options for lesson plans. 11.37 pm.

Wednesday 4th September 2019

Mainly proofreading Anomalies. Two hundred pages in seven hours. But many of those were pre-published reproductions from magazines. Wanted to read the entire text to see how it holds up as a book. So far, I’m very pleased with it. I’ll not get much more done on it till next Tuesday as I’m out tomorrow and have Poetry Jam admin on Friday then Haltwhistle workshop and gig at the weekend. 11.32 pm.

Thursday 5th September 2019

Out to Waddy this afternoon to prepare for Poetry Jam. Superb open floor sessions and mint guest spots this evening. Helen Marshall, Steve Lancaster and Elaine Cusack. Great to see the venue filled with enthusiastic people. Good to have some time with Jenni. Thanks to Fergus for the chat and ride home. 

11.57 pm.

Friday 6th September 2019

Didn’t get to sleep till twenty to four this morning. Awake again at eight so a bit low on energy but got my stuff ready for Haltwhistle. Made Writing Half Marathon booklets at lunchtime and uploaded Poetry Jam pix this afternoon. Shaved, sorted clothes. More Brexit shit tonight. Hopefully Johnson’s lot will be gone by December. 10.17 pm.

Saturday 7th September 2019

Up at 6.45 am. Three-hour journey to Haltwhistle. Nice little Writing Half Marathon in Old Booking Hall at the Rail Station this afternoon. Good to see people enjoying themselves, producing good stuff and keen to engage with the writing scene. Great of Maureen and James to invite me and Jenni over for the Centre of Britain Slam. Well done to David Roe for the win. All the poets got consistently high scores. We’re now in the Wallace Arms. 

11.00 pm.

Sunday 8th September 2019

Looked at some nineties poetry mags at Maureen and James’s house this morning. Went to Bardon Mill village hall then had cake and hot chocolate at the village shop. Thanks again to James and Maureen for looking after us. Got the 1.26 pm train from Haltwhistle to Newcastle. Then a food haul at Tesco. Slept a bit this evening, watched some game shows. 10.23 pm.

Monday 9th September 2019

Good sleep at Jen’s. Morning pages to prepare for the day. Chatted with Jen and ate a chocolate spread sandwich. Felt a bit sick on the bus to Durham. Canny chat with Ali and Peter at lunchtime. Had lentil soup. Workshop this afternoon was freewriting from prompts followed by plot generators. Afterwards an hour on FB reading up on proroguing of parliament and speaker Bercow’s resignation. Slept on the bus home. Watched the six o’clock news then read the last forty pages of ‘Dissecting Marilyn Manson’ by Gavin Baddeley – lots of stuff on Aleister Crowley, Anton la Vey, burlesque and vaudeville. Did some copy-ups and watched Newsnight. Johnson lost five out of five votes in a week. In any other walk of life he’d be shown the fucking door… 11.48 pm.

Tuesday 10th September 2019

The Tour of Britain cycling race came up on Facebook this morning with a list of key villages on the route. I rode down to Shotley Bridge for half eleven. About 200 people, including school kids, cheered the tour support cars, motorbikes and peloton. Afterwards I rode to Beamish and back. Need to get some exercise and be able to do ‘Terror in the Trees’ rides next month. Did a quarterly financial projection and should be able to stay afloat. Of course, that depends on how much the cost of living rockets if we leave the EU. I’m watching Newsnight and it’s looking like lots of Labour voters want to leave. 11.10 pm.

Wednesday 11th September 2019

Procrastination and fatigue. Hit a wall with Anomalies Deluxe coz a few pages made me cringe but removing them means replacing with something else or renumbering 200 titles on the contents list. Fell asleep for an hour. Read up on the political shit-show; how many lies and failures do we have to endure before the current lot are booted out? This evening Yellowhammer took an hour to read. Got 90 pages of my own stuff proofed. Tomorrow I need first session and assessment strategies in place for the autumn course at Waddy. 11.47 pm.

Thursday 12th September 2019

Long day, little progress: planning a proper course for the college always unsettles me. I’ve got hundreds of plans, but still end up looking for new material. This afternoon I spoke to Mam and Ernie on the phone. Mam has carpal tunnel syndrome in her left wrist. Ernie is okay. I did a bit more workshop stuff, read some of Chuck Palahniuk’s theories on fiction which I’ll show to the group at some point. No more work on Anomalies; will do some next week. Shaved. Listened to TV Smith; he is playing Newcastle on 24th January 2020 – the day before my 50th Birthday. 11.50 pm. 

Friday 13th September 2019

You must sign in electronically for security purposes. Have your photo taken and printed on a badge to wear that must be returned at the end of your visit. I’ve been employed there for over sixteen years. After one to one training today I successfully logged on to the system that I have to use to record my hours for payment this autumn. This afternoon I finally got round to watching the ‘David Bowie – A Reality Tour DVD’ that I bought shortly after his death in 2016. I’m unfamiliar with quite a lot of the songs but the concert kept me on the couch. The standout moment was Under Pressure. Bass player Gail Ann Dorsey’s vocals were a great stand-in for Mr Mercury and the lyrics seemed more poignant in these troubled times. Tonight I turned the BBC1 news off, packed up a load of laundry and bussed over to Jen’s place. Read some early Rollins vigettes on the way. Me and Jenni watched Scarborough and The Rocky Horror Picture Show. 10.17 pm.

Saturday 14th September 2019

Superfast morning pages today (16 minutes) then apple sauce porridge. Checked online updates then out to Newcastle. Jenni performed at the castle with Steve Lancaster, Ben Dawson Punshon, Donald Jenkins and Furo Todd. I didn’t feel up to taking part. Went to The Centurion afterwards and sat with some of Spontaneous Wrecks improv gang; then a bit of solo time in HMV checking out t-shirts, DVDs and Bowie albums; Tesco for supplies and a look at horror and music magazines then back to Jen’s for lentil soup and an evening of TV channel-hopping. 9.53 pm.

Sunday 15th September 2019

Ten and a half hours in bed. Morning pages then political nonsense on Facebook. Jenni did a spicy beanburger, hash browns and baked beans brunch. I had a lazy afternoon then Tesco for more food. Great DIY SOS 20^th anniversary recap on BBC this afternoon – moving stories of house builds for people in need. Read a Rebus story: ‘Not Provan’. Watched a Pet Shop Boys concert on BBC4. Jenni brought in simosa and chips (steak pie for me) for supper. 8.27 pm.