Another early finish today. Once again very welcome, I’m working through my options at the moment and trying to consolidate ahead of taking in a load more stuff. My pathways out are getting slightly more well trodden but there’s still much to be learnt. August is going to be research. September will be a huge movement out. And this winter I want to build something I believe in with what I think I’ll have, aiming for a spring launch.
I like the room I’m not in right now. The breaks are welcome as I almost always have vans to book. I’m not paying myself for any of my recent Globe jobs just to make sure there’s money in the bank against next week. I still think I might need another van but… it’ll be pricey and also I fear it might be crowded on site so I’m going to trust what my instincts have booked already.
We’ve been rehearsing upstairs at The Cockpit in a room I’m starting to know well. It’s hot up there. You can get a Chicken Shawarma in the market for £2.99 that will let you keep the contents of your stomach and tastes of something. But if you want a coffee you’re out of luck. There’s a place purporting to be Italian that will give you a superheated liquid that tastes more like battery acid once it finally gets to drinking temperature. All the places in a half mile radius are working with the same beans, which if not nuked at astonishing temperature have a residual taste of shoe leather. Likely it’s a racket by the local mob. Honestly the stuff is fucking AWFUL generally there. I’ve learnt to get a Lime Bike or walk for half an hour until I’m out of the radius if I want something palatable. Christ what am I, a fucking hipster? The epicentre of the bad coffee is Church Street. It isn’t a new problem, it’s been like that for decades.
You’re also in trouble if you want a drink after the show… That’s less relevant to me now obviously, and we are just using it for rehearsal either way. Muslim area, I guess – the mosque where I went and got advice about how to practice Ramadan is just down the road. The guy I spoke to had me tracking to Saudi time – I would wake up to an alarm and drink a huge bottle of water at about ten to three in the morning. I lasted about a week and a half. Nobody to do it with, and actually I’ve since learned that there’s really no need to be that strict. You can use the clock of your own country, I think… I was just trying to make sense of what so many people put themselves through. Not easy when you have nothing behind it but an unusual approach to self discipline and a curiosity. You need a community and a faith. That’s what it is about. Good to learn though.
Early bed tonight. It’s too hot to be awake. I’ll do the rest of the things tomorrow. Problem is it’s too hot to be asleep too. But I’ll give it a go. At least I don’t have to get up before dawn and drink a day’s water. And I’m not called until tomorrow afternoon.
