o no no no its the magic mountain

...
o no
we have the magic mountain
i'm gonna be here the whole winter
stuck indoors away from the 18 hour dark and the murderous murderous cold
and that gives me no excuse not to read it
o no
do you know how long it is
at least the holy sinner was short
do you know how thick that book is?
do you?
does anyone ever read thomas mann anymore?
they should
but do they?
...

would recommend
the holy sinner
to anyone
the bells the bells
man becomes hedgehog becomes pope
great stuff
...

and there's don quixote
but i've
always
wanted to read it
but been lazy or distracted

...

new pad

new pad
blimey its nice
bright new
very new

...
p has been buying stuff with her mum all week
since arriving last sunday
furnishing the rooms
buying stuff
and here we are
...
i have come home
home
very tired
kinda jaded
new bed
sweetheart
...
home
to a home i've never seen
...
nice drive from sask with dave dawson
and rachelle fordyce
...

got a message from bruce partington
who i wento school with
hi bruce
how's life?

bright sunny square green streets of my new home town
...

we won the cricket
hurrah

...

so here i am
edmonton
where i started this blog a year ago
a big fringe
tough in some ways
but with billions of audience
to go out and get
should reviews go poorly
...

i remember the first couple i flyered last year
they stopped moving as i spoke to them
they froze
and the man said very slowly
we are aware of your show jem
...
???
...

my first year here was hard
2003
the tour was going great but this was sticky all round
reviews
feeling
everything
i was an exceedingly full on english poet and it didn't feel they got it or me at all
at all
..
one show
the last saturday
when everyone else sold out
and my audience was chiefly composed of people who couldn't get in to everything else
blimey was it hideous
they made 10 per cent of the laughter and applause of any show on the tour that year
and i began to break half way through
at the end i didn't take a bow but simply ran
i bet i was 300 yards away before anyone else had left the building
..
i was discovered two hours later
wandering the streets
with a death mask rictus for a face
muttering
they didn't laugh... they didn't laugh...

and my second year i was trepidatious
was worried the whole westward way along the trail
and got here and people poured in in big numbers
and they were all like
we loved your show last year
and i was like
you know what
that is not what i remember
one of us wrong and you know what
its all of you

whatever, i had a great time
the audience caught onto me years before the reviewers did
...

and now i very much like this fringe
...

and respect it
...

this

that

out of that and into
...

NARMER and LUGALZAGESI

i've got the names

NARMER and LUGALZAGESI
the first egyptian
and the first sumerian
leader bastards
...

going home today
to a home i've never seen
...
out of this and into
...

end of fring end thing

end of fringe

...

well i've done my last show
and i'm done
kinda knackered and pretty happy
with a new home waiting for me
6 hours westwards in edmonton

...
saskatoon worked out
word of mouth
and flyering
did me fine in the end
it built nicely towards
100-120 punters in a glorious show
less laughing, but more rapt

it was one of those spaces which are great for the performer
but poor for the audience
sightlines are lousy
and the room heated up with the week
so once again i was
a drop of water with a human being inside
once again
the human waterfall
once again

the shiny sheen descending to the stagefloor

...
so i recovered from the dent of the star phoenix review
and did fine
did well
had a chilled laugh
and even made some cash
...
haggeringly stammered
...

the boozer the blag the bullshit the blah
the blog the babble the blagging and the blur

...
jayson meghan martin elison allan erik
lisa bremner dave amy
dan claire josh sarah matt daniel carly
peter cooley john stewart
...
the folks the gang the army the team
...

last night bumped into chuck hamilton
good slam poet of this parish
who reviewed me for planet s online
the sask freebie
and gave me a great review which was only 3 and a half stars
so i got to tell a reviewer that
3 and a half stars don't butter no parsnips
in fact it tells people DON'T GO
as in
DON'T GO
aka
do not go

which he didn't know and
most of them don't
...
...

have enjoyed sask more than ever before

and tomorrow off to the new home
p is well excited by it
and here i go again on the ever westward chute
...
...

dixie hummingbirds/ isley brothers

...
just watching the isleys brothers doing shout on youtube
and the dancing is very
very
like the dixie hummingbirds
the guys who kinda invented soul
witness
i've got so much to shout about
...
ain't that great?