And a sash saying 'Miss Truro'

2005rufus024
Originally uploaded by jamesandthebluecat.

Brilliant photo taken by Christina - Rufus last night was, in every sense of the word, fabulous. A very slightly iffy start when he told us that this was the first date of the tour, so could we be "critical, and sort of... English", which isn't the best thing to say to the Cornish. British, grudgingly, yes. English, no.

Certainly a less polished show than the Barbican, but somehow much more fun. I think there may have been an element of 'let's just muck about and see what works' and it was all the better for it. The striptease was a particularly marvellous moment, and never have I seen so many burly security guards staring down at their feet and blushing. Although I feel the rendition of "Gay Messiah' (dedicated very sweetly to the Pope) may have discreetly changed the life-course of one or two of the white-shirted guardians of order. I should possibly point out that dignity was maintained by the band retaining their undercrackers (glittery, in Rufus' case) and they went on to swathe themselves in towelling bathrobes bought from Truro M&S that very afternoon to do two more songs. However I worry the photographer from the West Briton* may have left his lens cap on at the crucial moment. Let's wait and see.

Ash Atalla (producer of 'The Office') in his latest Guardian column said that amongst recent emails, "James said I wrote 'pointless crap' but would I mind reading his sitcom script". Someone's already asked, and no, it wasn't me.

I held a door open for that Ash Atalla in Talkback once. He didn't say thank you. Nor did Angus Deaton, although at the time I think he had other things on his mind. Sarah Beeny however, gave me a lovely smile yesterday when we gently ushered her out of our meeting room yesterday, which we'd already booked from nine thirty thanks oh-so-very-much.

Well I say 'ushered', although in fact it was really more a 'waiting for people to leave' and I and three other GW writers stormed in to demand our room back, only for the sense of self-righteous vengeance to falter slightly when A) none of the people in (our) meeting room looked up or acknowledged us in any way and B) all the other GW guys chickened out and ran away, leaving me standing alone with angry words dying on my lips and one hand slightly raised for no reason. So I pretended I had gone into the wrong room and left again.

We tried again about three minutes later and it worked better this time, in that they were leaving anyway. Still, as I said, a lovely smile.

The Guardian newsblog had a link to McSweeneys, which isn't always, I feel, quite as funny as it thinks it is (not a hanging crime, thank god), but I haven't looked at it for ages, and I thought this was quite lovely.




* The local Falmouth paper is, by the way, called 'The Falmouth Packet'. Some people choose to find this funny, and I know of at least one person in Kent who has it delivered weekly just to laugh at the name. More refined types will understand that the Packet ships were the little boats that went out to the big ships to pick up and deliver packets of mail. I didn't even realize 'packet' could be considered a rude word until I went to university, which goes to show something I haven't worked out yet in its entirety.

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Matt says:

I think you're wrong on the packet ships. The packet ships _were_ the big boats, they didn't have tenders that i know of.
They were called packet ships cos they were shipping packets, v early mail delivery all around the world.I believe the packet ships themselves used to come in and tie up just above Tesco's, which is where "the moor" comes from.probably more water there at that point.... not 100%, but pretty sure that is right.

Matt