After a fairly exhausting week having lots of fun dashing about north of the border, I’ve been back for a week of gentle recovery having fought my way through the festival hordes at Waverley station; not being a theatre person I had no idea about the event when I organised the trip (fitting it conveniently around the end of the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, another favourite city) and it’s testimony to the usual Edinburgh hotel prices that whilst I noticed it was steep, it wasn’t outrageous enough to warrant further investigation and I count myself lucky in retrospect to have found anything at all…
My turn for the annual entertainment-a-thon in the form of FrightFest approaches this coming Thursday evening, and availability on the preceding days in Victoria is dwindling steadily; hopefully the temperature will be a little easier to cope with than the other week. I’ll assure everybody now that I’m at least back in a real hotel, thank God. Please note that bar occasional checks, the work phone will be off from the lunchtime of Thursday 21st August and not back on again until Wednesday 27th at the earliest – callers will find this one out when they ring, but for the benefit of texters I won’t get your messages. As ever, email, please!
Watching twenty six or so horror films (plus associated introductions and Q&A sessions) in four-and-a-bit days can be gruelling stuff indeed (although deciding between the Saturday early evening offering and the Doctor Who premiere a few yards away at the Empire was more so, particularly for a dedicated Peter Capaldi fan) but by way of refreshment after a very long few weeks it always does the job – this year’s event boasts (amongst others) a guest appearance and Q&A by Robert Englund to introduce a thirtieth anniversary screening of A Nightmare on Elm Street, which makes me feel not only very old, but also glad that mobile phones were not around at the time – having been twelve by the time it arrived in our local video shop I doubt I would have got any sleep at all for most of the ensuing year from staying awake all night texting after watching it from behind the sofa with classmates (which we did many, many times after muchas begging of various people’s older siblings to rent it out for us). Happy days.
As promised, exciting progress is afoot back in Scarborough, and I look forward to announcing new incall arrangements soon! Hopefully by this time next month at least; local punters will be glad to hear that same day and half hour bookings will not only be on the cards, but newbies will be welcomed and a special day rate offered too – hooray! I might even put the kettle on, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
Whilst this will mark a distinct downturn in the seemingly endless and increasingly tiring charging about, non-local folk need not fear – I will still be visiting, just less often, and Londoners will barely notice a difference at all! Ditto New Yorkers – the next of my twice-yearly-ish visits is sneaking up fast and will hopefully provide a perfectly-timed respite from the shenanigans here (and if not, between the High Line, Shake Shack and Century 21 I can hardly say I won’t be trying).
More soon! Bring on the popcorn…
