Monday 19th October. 6.25 p.m. Oh dear. My MacBook has been playing up! I had intended printing out the latest play I had written (more about that later.) I had bought the required ink cartridge from Argos, along with some paper, although there was a considerable amount still left in the drawer under the printer, but I didn't think it was a good idea to be short of paper, once the printer started. This play runs to a little over 90 pagers, so to run out in the middle of printing might cause problems. Then the MacBook refused point blank to cooperate and wouldn't open and I was left staring at a blank screen. What to do? The only answer was to go into the Apple store in Midsummer Place and ask someone to help resolve this very tiresome issue. I went in, having checked that the roads weren't closed off because of resurfacing, which is why I had the issue the other morning when I attempt4ed to go to Sainsburys.
So, I walked into Midsummer Place and then foundmmyself in the Apple store. You have to book an appointment and then, qround ten minutes later an assistant was looking at the lqptop. He took it away and returned around 10 minutes later, having looked qt the battery and told me that the problem was caused by the external hard drive, which was taking power from the MacBook. So, not a problem at all, so I returned home to hopefully print the play, using the Canon printer.
As for the play, I will explain where the idea came from. I have told you about the Wednesday afternoon tea party in the communal lounge at Dextrer house, which has become something of a fixture. A chance to have s natter and share thoughts about living in Dexter House. Well, for the past few weeks, a member of staff has been coming in. I think she is an SHO at another sheltered housing unit in Milton Keynes. She put me in mind of a character in a Mike Leigh play, probably the most famous one 'Abigail's Party' which stars Alison Stedman. She not only vaguely looks like a Mike Leigh character, she SOUNDS like one. So, I csame up with the idea of this woman, married to a small business, a back-street motor repair shop, and they live in the middle flat of a block of flats, and it's new Year\s Eve and they've prepared for a party, inviting friends to come and celebrate the newYear, with things ro eqrt, a buffet, lots to eat and then people stqrt tqlking. Well, that's the starting point, and it has just more or less written itself.
Tuesday. 20th October. 6.25 a.m. I had intended to begin this blog post diffrerently, which explains the title.
You may recall in an earlier blog post, how I detest cricket and football. I think I can now work out why this might be. When I was at school we played these games, and would go to the games field up a hill in Manton Lane in Bedford (which is now where Bedford Modern School was relocated in aound the 1970s.) It was a real trudge up that hil, usually in thick mud which clung to your boots. Then, at the top, in the middle of winter particularly, with wind whistling up from the ton below, chilling your bones and it took all your effort to stand up streight, shivering and covered in mud. I suffered really badly from cold, so it made life worse. Then, we would be divided into two teams, if we were about to play football, and in summer, cricket. Becauee I was so bad at playing the game, I inevitably got selected last. This didn't exactly make me excited to play either game. I know I was a lousy footballer, but running around on a muddy, extremly chilly piece of grass, dressed in shorts and short-sleeved shirt (I don't remember if those shirts had shoirt or long sleeves, to be honest.) and not really having the faintest idea how the stupid game was played, didn't exactly help.
I have got it! The bit about not knowing how the game was played! We were expected to go out on the fotballl pitch and launch into aropund 90 minutes of football, and understand all the rules, which end was your end, which was the goal you were aiming to kick the ball into, how to tackle someone who had the ball. Now, I have hit the nail on the head, for cricket and football. Why weere we never coached in how to play the game, to even be given some sort of tqlk about the rules? It seems that this was typical of a lot of topics in the 1960's and possibly earlier. Things were not made any easier because of my inability to kick a ball straight or not hit the cricket ball when one was lobbed at me. I think it might be the fqct that I should have been left-handed and was made (forced, more likely) to write and use my right hand. This, I believe, was normal practice in the 1960' and earlier. I would say it was, to make life easier for the teachers. If you had a child who was different, say, left-haanded, it would be more complicated. They wanted everyone to be identical. Well, I wasn't.
It was the same in other areas of my life.I'm thinking, when I worked in stage management. We had to do a variety of jobs, operate the sound deck, which included making up show tapes, editing recording tape, then playing sound effects into the show, given cues to foloow, actually running the prompt corner, taking rehearsals, marking out the floor of the rehearsal room with coloured tape, operating the fly floor, the list goes on and on. My worst job was tieing knots, which might not seem important, but it was. I could never tie ropes to fly-fqrs, which were used to hqul up scenery, curtains or lighting. I don't ever remember being shown how to do thqt job. It would have been fqr more sense to show someone new how to do these jobs.
Thinking about all this, particularly knowing how to play sport, such as cricket or football, the fact that I never got any coaching, puts me in mind of putting on a play. You would never expect an actor or a group of actors, to go out on stage without rehearsals. It would never work, for start. You havee to learn lines, the moves around the stage, entrances and exits, who goes where. The sae with the stage crew, you need to know how the whole play works, have the props sourced, arranged in the correct place, along with the sound and lighting cues. It's surely the same with playing a game of football or cricket, if you don't know how it is played, all the rules and regulations, how are you expected to give your best?
