Boris Biking Day One

I spent all today on a Boris Bike.

Registered yesterday, £45 for the year, less than yesterday's return rail fare to Birmingham to do an episode of the Archers. Key arrived this morning, registered it online before going to work, bus to King's Cross, crossed road, put key in slot, had a bike! First 30 minutes free, biked to Soho, didn't have to take saddle off, find lock, find key, attatch bike to pillar, worry that bike would be stolen - no, just went CHUNK into a slot and strolled round the corner to do a voiceover for Jaguar sponsoring cricket.

Sashayed out 20 minutes later, put key in slot (in pouring rain), cycled gently to Knightsbridge to have much needed haircut, CHUNK, not my responsibility any more, ate sushi from Waitrose sitting on a wall (this bike business has got me on a fitness thing), had haircut, got bike back, went to Victoria to meet old friend from America, drank beer, reclaimed bike, drove up Mall, up Tot Ct Rd, turned right onto cycle lane city then, triumphant with new found excitement and fitness, just needing to ditch it at King's Cross to get bus home, couldn't find anywhere to dock the bloody bastard thing. In three different places, all the docking places were full, despite my brilliant iPhone app that told me they were free. Teething prob here - in the evenings, it will be impossible to find a docking station free near any of the mainline stations unless they make some more. Big it up for Errol from Maintainance who was pulling out a duff bike as I arrived at my last ditch docking port (this is beginning to sound like Star Trek). Top man Errol.

Observations.
It's great. I have spent years bicycling around London and it's always been a hassle. The difference with this is that you've got a big London Transport roundel on the front and as such you're not a pesky cyclist, but a sort of one-man bus. In bus lanes I could sense Buses and Taxis giving me more respect. I know they loathe 'cyclists' - I've got an HGV licence and I know how difficult it is to negotiate people on bicycles driving a large vehicle. I can re-assure regular cyclists however that you don't pass that test until it is seen that you have a hyper awareness of cycles and pedestrians. The HGV test is akin to the idea of Noblesse oblige - "I know I'm the bigest thing on the road, so I don't, like some dickless midget in a BMW, have to keep trying to be, so I will be aware and considerate." Taxis slightly less so, but they too spent years getting the Knowlege and are to be respected. Buses I am never sure of, because their drivers vary from the absolutely brilliant, to the psychotic and lethal.

Also, when I used to ride my own bike, I felt that bicycle lanes were somehow an affront to my independence - I don't need some interfering, health and safety pedant telling me what part of the road I should wobble in - I'll go where I like - I'm free!!

Well I'm 57 now, and I totally adored the sturdy, sit-up-and-beg, London Transport, little bit of London, pootle down the cycle lane, ignore the driving rain, feeling sort of Dutch, stopping for the traffic lights, getting where you want to, CHUNK and walk away-ness of it all.

I had more conversations with perfect strangers today than I've had for years. Everyone was giving me the thumbs up, having a chat, 'What's it like?', laughing, 'Brilliant!' - if I'd been single I would absolutely have pulled.

Finally. 'Boris Bike". Ok, I know that it was Ken's idea in the first place, and good on him for that, but it really is a good idea and it will become as much a part of London as the double-decker very soon. What would we really rather its nickname was, a Boris bike or a Ken bike? I rather feel that if I'd ridden round London today on a Ken Bike, I might have encountered a girl on a Barbie Bike. I saw four others today on, to give them their true name, a Barclays Bike, and none of them were wearing helmets. I know it's dangerous but I was born in 1953 and spent my whole childhood on a bike -AND I'm pootling in a green cycle lane. I'm a Londoner. I like this freedom. It's more Boris-ish than Ken-ish.

Educating Rita

After two months at the Watermill Theatre in Newbury I have finally finished Educating Rita. What an experience. Here's what I wrote at my nadir in the second week of rehearsal:

Well tell you what ol' darlin, this is the real bleeding deal!

It's like being in the army, or at least back in school. Three weeks on camp. My morning commute takes one minute, ten seconds exactly. We rehearse all day, have a meal in the pub, and go to bed early, learning lines. On Wednesday I had had totally sleepless night, not a wink, don't know why. The next morning we did a run of the whole play, when my mind was a thing running along behind my body, trying to catch up. It was just like the actor's nightmare. At one point I thought I actually couldn't carry on, I felt ill, panicked, and brain-dead, but my futile look of pleading only got a prompt and I carried on somehow to the end. Simply not at the races.
You can't do it on no sleep.
That night I drove to the all-night pharmacy at Sainsbury's, which, thanks to my new mobile dongle on the computer, I Googled my way to, and bought something called Nytol on recommendation of others. Watched movie in bed, didn't feel at all sleepy, although totally zonked and wet from having fallen in bog when having crafty fag in the moonlit nature reserve opposite our little house. Took another Nytol. Slept like I was in the arms of angels for nine hours. Salvation.
Today we ran it for the first time in front of the production team, our first audience.
It hummed. It flew. Instead of just surviving we were telling a story, playing the laughs, really talking to each other, feeling the emotions.
AT LAST!!!
I had reached rock bottom and actually said to myself out loud, 'whatever made you think you could do this?'. Serious panic for a bit. Still face prospect of actually doing it - and matinees! Twice a bloody day!!
However I am disciplining myself, have lost weight, have cut back on the booze, am working with this quite wonderful girl, Claire Lams, whose Rita is a force of nature. Keeping up is fantastically exciting. Running with it, like we did today, is still scary, but when it works it's just fantastic.
What's really nice now is going back to the script, and re-learning it, learning all the sense, and without the panic.
I haven't worked this hard for a very long time.

That was then. Six weeks later it was playing to packed houses and standing ovations. I'll miss it in due course, but just now the luxury of not having to get nervous every night is just bliss!

Here's a taste for those who missed it:
www.newburytoday.co.uk/News/FlashNewsPlayer.aspx?articleID=11385&CategoryID=

Ipswich Magistrates Court

In December 2005 I was caught by a camera on the dual carriageway inner ring road in Birmingham doing 41 mph. The speed limit on that road is 40mph, but I didn’t realise this stretch was 30mph. In April 2007 I went to overtake a car on a straight stretch of A road in Norfolk. He accelerated and I was forced to exceed the limit to get past, I was flashed by a hidden mobile camera unit. In October 2007, I was photographed doing 49mph on an A road that I didn’t realise had a 40 mph limit on that straight. In July 2008 a mobile camera snapped me doing 64mph on a dual carriageway about 100 yards before it was legal to do 70.

Ipswich Magistrates Court April 22nd - Pleading for Exceptional Hardship to escape mandatory 6 months driving disqualification.

It was astonishing. I'd rehearsed this scene in my head on and off for a year and a half (it's a very long boring story), talking to a stern, morose, heartless bastard who would take my car away from me for six months for doing 64 about 100 yards before it was legal to do 70 and two months before it wouldn't have mattered as the oldest points would have expired. I had pages of mitigating circumstances, having to prove 'Exceptional Hardship', not so much for me, but for other people. I had letters from charities, photographs, maps, hospital reports, you name it. Six powerful arguments - and all, I hasten to add, true. Met the barrister an hour before and he said not to push it, go with two - the work and the charities.

When it got to it, it was like going to see a particularly sweet and fair headmaster who totally understands your position and laughs at your jokes. He hardly needed any persuading, was very sympathetic and said that a ban would be 'entirely disproportionate'. He was about to let me off, when he suddenly paused and said, ' Wait a minute.' My heart stopped. 'If I let you off this means that you'll still have 12 points on your licence and will have to be driving around for... let's see... another TWO YEARS with this sword of Damocles hanging over your head, because you won't be able to argue this again, you'd be banned straight away, and let's face it it's almost impossible to avoid being flashed these days, cameras everywhere (verbatim I swear). What if I disqualified you for, say, fourteen days, then you'd just have a fortnight off, after which all the points would be wiped from your licence, would you rather do that?'

He gave me the choice! I mean I couldn't have thought of a better outcome in my wildest dreams! After ALL THAT WORRY. Just shows - smile, it may never happen.

So Jude's my slave for a fortnight, I'm going to sit in the back of the car and say 'Are we there yet?' all the way to Norfolk.

Whooopeeee!