Chiswick, Sir Terry and a bloke in a pub

Back in August of last year (ouch!) I mentioned that I was a teensy weensy bit excited about the possibility of seeing Sir Terry Pratchett at the Chiswick Book Festival. I might also have hinted that I’d be a teensy weensy bit upset if I didn’t get a ticket.

Well, you’ll be pleased to hear – after a year and a bit – that I did get a ticket, hurrah! In fact I got two – and my other half (who’s not in the least bit Pratchetty) came with me (well, someone had to be nearby to peel me off the floor in case I collapsed in sheer pleasure).

What can I say?! It was truly wonderful and inspiring! He spoke for ages and charmed the room completely. And afterwards we all stood twitching nervously in line, eagerly clutching our books for signing… and look! Here’s the back of my shoulder, and Sir Terry himself signing my book!

And look! Here’s the signed book!

Excuse me while I pause for a moment to relish the memories…

…

…

Right. Where was I?

Ah yes. But what about the bloke in the pub, I hear you cry? How could a bloke in a pub possibly fit in with this story?

Well.

I was in such a swoon after all that signingage and Pratchettyness that my other half had no option but to carry my limp body across the road to the nearest hostelry, and attempt to revive me by way of a big, fat pint.

As we sat outside the heaving Tabard, wedged into the end of a table, me babbling madly about Sir Terry and all things Pratchetty, my other half gave me a sudden nudge and one of those looks that says “My god, look! It’s HIM!”

Turning quickly, I nearly headbutted a very large tray bristling with pints, and looked straight up into the large, be-hatted face looming over the tray.

I stared, squinted a bit, squinted a bit more, then shook my head, looked back at my other half and gave one of those really big, obvious “I have absolutely NO idea who that is” shrugs. I also pulled that face. You know, that “I dunno!” one.

Then – and only then – I squidged along the seat to let the guy pass, whilst my other half tried not to curl up in a little ball of shame next to me.

And he told me that I had just – from a distance of about a foot – completely and very obviously failed to recognise Al Murray. Otherwise known as The Pub Landlord.

In a pub.

With him carrying a tray full of beer.

Well. He shouldn’t have been wearing that hat then, should he…

*blush…*

Santa’s secret…

This time last year (almost to the day) I noticed Santa had a reindeer issue – he and his sleigh were outside Derby train station with not a reindeer in sight.

I’m sorry to report that this year things have got even worse.

This morning, there was the sleigh – all twinkly lights and tinny music – and once again, not a reindeer in sight. But there was something else missing.

Santa himself.

Maybe he’s on strike, or ill this year? Or maybe he’s been laid off himself what with all this continuing recession business? Or perhaps he is travelling by train after all, got separated from his sleigh in a platform mix-up and was coming on a later train?

Nah.

I have another solution to this conundrum. It’s obvious really, and has to do with the stress of the recession, and having to lay off his reindeers and what-not.

He’s taken up smoking, and was hiding round by the car park having a secret-Santa-cigarette.

Case closed.

The Great Scooter Escapade…

Hello? Hello? Remember me? It’s been a while…

But I have an excuse for my prolonged absence… It’s a sad one though. It involved a Daddy that lived abroad, who got a bit poorly after Christmas last year, then really poorly… then in August we lost him.

Dad was such an inspiration to me in many, many ways – from his curiosity in everything to his cheeky sense of humour (sometimes it was very hard to tell if he was serious or joking!) – and he certainly wasn’t the sort of bloke that would like to see me sitting around being sad, so I’ve been focusing on lovely memories, and I’d like to share one with you here

When my Mum and Dad were ‘courting’ (top word!) they used to go off for trips on Dad’s scooter. One dark, rainy night they were trundling along somewhere in Gloucester and as they went over a railway crossing (called California Crossing), the scooter slipped on the rails and they both came off. Mum was fine, but Dad hurt his elbow, so he asked Mum to drive. Bit of a controversial move that as Mum was just a learner…

Can you guess what happened next?!

They got back on the scooter, Mum on the front driving, and off they went. Within seconds, Mum completely failed to negotiate a turn and ditched the scooter!

And here, ladies and gentleman, are my proud parents, shortly after the afore mentioned incident – note how chuffed they both look, how the scooter is missing it’s big glass windscreen and how it shows evidence of serious dintage to the front mudguard!

I’ve known and loved that photo for years, but only known the story for about a year – it so happened that I was chatting to Dad one night and mentioned that my other half (who works on the railway) was working in Gloucester that night. And Dad related the story of the Great California Crossing Scooter Escapade.

Thanks for reading! x

It’s been a while…

…a very long while…

But I’m nearly back!

Watch this space…

Reindeer Issues?

I think Santa has a little problem. He was outside Derby station this morning with his sleigh, and there wasn’t a reindeer in sight.

I can only assume that the reindeer are ill, on strike, or have become yet more victims of the recession and have been laid off due to the high cost of jingle-bell upkeep.

Whatever has happened to them, Santa has obviously been forced to switch to a back-up plan and travel by train this year. He’s probably making an early start to avoid being late due to engineering works and possible sudden snow.

Actually, now I think about it, the recession can’t be the reason, as I’m pretty sure when you add the costs of all Santa’s train tickets up, they’ll come to considerably more than the cost of replacing a few jingle-bells. Unless he’s been given a free train pass…

No, me neither. Strike or ill it is.

A lost teddy, a shed, a Sir, and an Irving…

I’m rather upset.  I’ve had this blog rattling around my head for a while now, but it required a visit to the loft to find a certain element to photograph and include.  So I finally went up there at the weekend, went to the box where said element should have been in… and it wasn’t there.  Random and rather manic searching elsewhere proved fruitless.  So what prompted this search, and what was the item that has mysteriously disappeared out of its box?  Well.  In a battered old Body Shop notebook dating back to the mid-1990s, which contains (amongst other things) the random scribbled ideas for the first Shed story, is the following line:

‘Why did the yellow teddy get left in the shed?’

Are you there yet?  No?  Want another minute or two? Okay…

Now?  Good. Yes, I was looking for the yellow teddy.  It’s rather a sad old yellow teddy. Quite small, and rather… square looking.  It had a squeaker in it.   At some point in my very small life, this yellow teddy went missing.  I must have been very small, too small to remember it going missing.  Or maybe it wasn’t a very well-loved teddy, so its missing-ness wasn’t that important.  Hope not, that’s a terrible thought.

Anyway, when I was a bit bigger, a momentous occasion occured: The Pulling Down of The Shed Day.  This shed was, quite possibly, one of the bestest, most wonderfullest of sheds ever in the entire world.  Ever.  My dad might have built it from scratch.  It had been painted white at some point, but by the time The Pulling Down of The Shed Day came around, it was a bit fadey.  Step One was to get everything out of the shed into the garden, and it was during this mammoth task that the yellow teddy was found.  To be absolutely honest, I’ve no idea if it was mine or my sisters.  But when it was found, I remember feeling extremely sorry for it (having been left amongst the cobwebs down the back of the workbench for so long) and rather sad and guilty – I also remember only vaguely remembering it, and feeling bad about that too.  Actually, now I think about, maybe it wasn’t even ours – maybe it belonged to some friend of ours… oh dear. Sorry.

But it was given a wash by mum (and probably pegged out on the washing line by its ears), and I know I’ve seen it recently.

But where is it?

And why is it important?

Well, it’s just that in the shed stories, the main character has a small yellow bear.  It doesn’t get a lot of attention in the stories, and it has no lines (being a teddy, obviously, which can’t speak.  Unlike elephants.  And lions.  And vultures.  And zebras. Which – obviously – can).  But it’s The Bear!  And I can’t find it!  And it was lost for years once before, and now it’s lost again!

I’m sure you can all feel my pain.  I’m too upset now to carry on, change of subject required…

Sir Terry Pratchett.  Chiswick Book Festival.  If I don’t get tickets there’ll be serious tears.  Please, please cross your fingers for me…  The thought of even possibly being in the same room as Him sends me rather bonkers, let alone the possibility of hearing him speak (or hearing someone speak on his behalf) and even (faint!) getting the latest Tiffany Aching book signed by him… Ooooooh, I can barely type!

I have five major writing heroes.  Two are sadly no longer with us – Roald Dahl and Charles Dickens.  Of the remaining three, I’ve seen ONE in the flesh and it blew me away, and was an indescribable inspiration.  That was John Irving in the mid-1990s, reading from the newly published ‘A Son of the Circus’ in Waterstones in Hampstead, London.  Every John Irving book I’ve read (or re-read – and believe me, I do a lot of re-reading) since has been spoken in his voice – if you get what I mean.  And I honestly don’t think I’ve ever been so terrified and nervous as when I was standing in the queue to get my copy signed.  I had in my head a line of his I was going to ask him to write (if I dared), but as I got nearer and nearer his desk, I became aware that every person – with no exception – was asking him to write the same thing.  If you know your Irving, you’ll have guessed what it was…

‘Keep passing the open windows.’

How could it have been anything else?

So I panicked.  ‘My god,’ I thought, ‘This poor man has been sitting here all evening writing the same thing over and over again… he must need a break! I can’t possibly ask him to write that again!’

Then suddenly it was my turn.

I was standing at a desk, looking down at John Irving.  John Irving.  JOHN IRVING!!! The guy that wrote Garp, and The Water Method Man, and The Hotel New Hampshire, and OWEN FLIPPIN’ MEANY!!!

The guy that has the power to write things that make me laugh and cry and stay up all night turning page after page after page… even if I’m reading the book for the umpteenth time…  the guy that was the inspiration to me to start trying to write…

The next few seconds went like this:

Mr Irving: Hello, [nice friendly smile] what would you like me to write?

Me:

(are you ready for this?)

Me: [in a very small and silly, wobbly voice] To Michelle.

So he did. And I left.

Pathetic, isn’t it?!

But it was one of the most amazing experiences of my life, and said book is – and always will be – one of my most treasured possessions. Look, here’s the cover sheet:

And in case you’re wondering, the other two living writers on my hero list are Sir Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman.  If I am lucky enough to get tickets for Sir Terry, goodness knows what a plonker of myself I’ll make if I get the chance to get a book signed… I’m cringing just thinking about it… but it will be so worth it… wow…

Right, enough.

I hate to mention it, but it’s a black-bin Tuesday so I have a little job to do…

ps… the observant amongst you will be thinking ‘Michelle? I thought her name was Rose?’
It’s both.

The little ash cloud…

Oh dear. I’ve been neglecting my blog. It’s all been a bit hectic here, mainly due to me suddenly finding myself in full-time employment again which has drastically eaten in to my online time. Thinky-writing time is still good though, as I have a couple of hours train commute a day, and a whole hour for lunch (gasp, luxury!).

And then that volcano went off again last week… so I haven’t been able to help myself. My first weekend after a full week of ‘proper‘ (?!) work has seen me glued to volcano webcams and Twitter… My name’s Rose Appleby and I’m a volcano fetishist…

Anyway, thought I’d better plop a quick blog, and what better thing to do with it than to share with you a silly little poem that’s been brewing about The Ash Cloud (I think it deserves initial caps, don’t you?). Like the ash cloud, it’s probably going to keep growing, but here it is so far…

I had a little ash cloud,
I fed it every day.
But then my little ash cloud
began to blow away…

It blew to Scandinavia,
it blew to Scotland too.
And then it blew to England -
I don’t know what to do.

My lovely little ash cloud
is causing quite a fuss.
Instead of people flying
they are forced to go by bus…

There’s people stuck in China
and strange sunsets on the Tyne;
I’m getting quite embarrassed of
that cheeky cloud of mine…

There, that’s what we have so far. Raw and uncut.

And now back to the webcams… oh dear… I’m such a volcano geek…