I have just watched The Dog practically tear itself in two,attempting to follow two men's trousers simultaneously. I had a girlfriend like that, once. She left Liverpool at the point where she had slept with a chap for a second time, thinking it was the first.Although admirable in terms of recycling, I can see how it might be muddling. She also went out with a large number of people for a pre-wedding celebration, and toddled home with the groom-to-be.This cast something of a froideur over her relationships with that particular circle of friends,and she felt,accurately, that she needed more scope. So she moved to London.
I went to live in That London with the slight sense of relief that comes with the realisation that no-one could care less who you were or what you were up to as long as it didn't disrupt the Circle Line. I didn't have a colourful romantic history, being roundly loathed by most of the boys of the city. The people I knew were musical,in one way or another. With a couple of honourable exceptions, they had no time for girls,as the serious business of talking about their music and avoiding paid work whilst funding various intoxicants did not allow for female input ,conversationally speaking. A couple of brave and original women entered into the fray, and started bands,wrote and produced music, became performers, but it was quite the Boy's World in the early 80's. I had less than zero interest in anyone with a musical instrument, and no aspirations that way myself, luckily for everyone. No, I hurled myself onto the stage,instead. It started with Lunchtime Theatre,and the idea was that a group of acting persons took drama to the huddled masses trying to eat their sandwiches, and acted at them until they gave in and watched.This involved vans. I never trust any enterprise in which a van plays a part; there are dread situations ahead. These will inevitably centre around desolate petrol stations , cables and loops of wire, pools of rusty water on the floor of said vehicle, and keys being lost. In fact there is a big blue one outside right now,where the builders retire at lunchtime to eat sandwiches of a Chicken Tikka nature. But despite the van element, the glamour of the stage had got to me,and I happily signed up to perform socially aware drama in Working Men's Clubs in Warrington. Because I had a slightly posh voice and a haughty demeanour (mostly due to shortness of sight), I was,in those Anti-Thatcherite times, always cast as the Oppressive Bitch.Sometimes, though, I was an Oppressed Whore. I only really cared about the number of lines and the prettiness of my costume;you would have been observing me for a long time before being reminded of Vanessa Redgrave.
I was actually a Gaiety Girl/show-off, rather than an actress. After a range of tart's parts from Chaucer to Pinter,and a spell playing men in experimental productions of Shakespeare in Chester, I settled into cabaret, as the token woman with some more drag queens.
Shouting in a corset at night turned out to be so much more ONE.
But I do not have time today to relate further, as I hear the sounds of a man with a saw. "A Saw What?" you might well enquire, if you have a tendresse for music hall.If he is grumpy today, I have a Hinge and Bracket mug that is bound to bring a tremulous smile to the lips of the grimmest builder,if you ask me.
I went to live in That London with the slight sense of relief that comes with the realisation that no-one could care less who you were or what you were up to as long as it didn't disrupt the Circle Line. I didn't have a colourful romantic history, being roundly loathed by most of the boys of the city. The people I knew were musical,in one way or another. With a couple of honourable exceptions, they had no time for girls,as the serious business of talking about their music and avoiding paid work whilst funding various intoxicants did not allow for female input ,conversationally speaking. A couple of brave and original women entered into the fray, and started bands,wrote and produced music, became performers, but it was quite the Boy's World in the early 80's. I had less than zero interest in anyone with a musical instrument, and no aspirations that way myself, luckily for everyone. No, I hurled myself onto the stage,instead. It started with Lunchtime Theatre,and the idea was that a group of acting persons took drama to the huddled masses trying to eat their sandwiches, and acted at them until they gave in and watched.This involved vans. I never trust any enterprise in which a van plays a part; there are dread situations ahead. These will inevitably centre around desolate petrol stations , cables and loops of wire, pools of rusty water on the floor of said vehicle, and keys being lost. In fact there is a big blue one outside right now,where the builders retire at lunchtime to eat sandwiches of a Chicken Tikka nature. But despite the van element, the glamour of the stage had got to me,and I happily signed up to perform socially aware drama in Working Men's Clubs in Warrington. Because I had a slightly posh voice and a haughty demeanour (mostly due to shortness of sight), I was,in those Anti-Thatcherite times, always cast as the Oppressive Bitch.Sometimes, though, I was an Oppressed Whore. I only really cared about the number of lines and the prettiness of my costume;you would have been observing me for a long time before being reminded of Vanessa Redgrave.
I was actually a Gaiety Girl/show-off, rather than an actress. After a range of tart's parts from Chaucer to Pinter,and a spell playing men in experimental productions of Shakespeare in Chester, I settled into cabaret, as the token woman with some more drag queens.
Shouting in a corset at night turned out to be so much more ONE.
But I do not have time today to relate further, as I hear the sounds of a man with a saw. "A Saw What?" you might well enquire, if you have a tendresse for music hall.If he is grumpy today, I have a Hinge and Bracket mug that is bound to bring a tremulous smile to the lips of the grimmest builder,if you ask me.
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