It’s happening. It is actually happening. Singles’ Holiday, the stageplay, is happening! After so many months of writing, re-writing, read-throughs, auditions, meetings, hoping and dreaming, it will soon be performed on stage. I am trembling with excitement!
How lucky am I? It is an author’s dream to see their work come to life – certainly it has been this author’s dream for a long, long time. I was excited at the various read-throughs we had but tonight… tonight we all got together and suddenly – there it was! I am truly blessed. I know that the next three weeks will pass in a flash; there’s so much to do and accomplish in that time. But I KNOW that we will do it and that it will be a roaring success. I am so happy and proud and thank everyone concerned – the actors, the director, the producer – for the faith they’ve shown in my script by agreeing to be a part of it. We are on at the Brentwood Theatre 13-17 October. http://www.brentwood-theatre.co.uk
It’s been an extra-busy week. We also had our first cast meeting for Cinderella on Tuesday evening. That produced a great buzz! Once again, I can’t believe the pool of talent we’ve got in the cast, including veteran actor Peter Dean, and am grateful for everyone’s participation and enthusiasm. We’ve got a bit more time to work on that as it’s 18-28 December at the Brookside, Romford http://www.brooksidetheatre.com/whatson.htm But I’m sure before we can look round it’ll be dress rehearsal! Especially as I’ve already seen loads of Christmas stuff in the shops.
Most of the past week, since I got back from Antigua, has been spent on the final edit of Single All The Way. I am cross-eyed and hunch-backed! But happy!! Lovely to have people already asking when it’s coming out and enquiring about buying it. it will be out mid-October, all things being equal. I must admit that this has been the most challenging of the Singles’ Trilogy to write – not least of all because it’s set at Christmas (as you probably guessed from the title!) and I was writing it in 30C+ while I was in Antigua. Quite a few familiar faces from my previous books make an appearance, which I hope readers will like.
On a more mundane note, I’ve had a bit of an NHS week. I had a mammogram on Tuesday at Harold Wood Polyclinic. Now, you’d think something like a clinic would be easily accessible, wouldn’t you? Well, not this one. I was told it was on the site of the old Harold Wood Hospital. Well, it is, but between it and the road is a whole housing estate and a campus of the University of the South Bank. The final approach is through a very narrow road with a four-way traffic light. Allow an extra ten minutes to get from the road to the clinic. No! Make that fifteen, because you also have to find a parking space. Not easy because the car park has no bays and consequently everyone parks their 4x4s in the space for three cars. On a positive note – parking is FREE. Once I found it and a parking space I went inside. At the enquiries desk I was told in hushed tones by a receptionist that the mammogram department is on the first floor. I went up to the first floor and found myself in the physiotherapy department. Mammograms are at the back of it through two sets of doors. I felt as if I was going to the famous Secret Bunker instead of a clinic! And then, as any woman will tell you, the pleasure of shoving the sharp, cold metal corner of the plate in your armpit while the radiographer lifts your breast and places it on the glass and then tightens the top glass down on it. It is what it must feel like to have a bus slowly back over your boob. Only slightly less painful!! Still, another positive point is that I’m grateful to live in a country where things like mammograms are freely available.
Wednesday meant another early morning as I had to go to Queen’s Hospital for an x-ray on my left foot as it’s much wider than the right one, due to what looks like a bunion. During the summer it doesn’t matter so much as I wear sandals, but now that we’re getting into autumn and I’ll soon have to start wearing proper shoes then the problems begin. A pair of shoes doesn’t fit me. If the right shoe fits, the left is too tight to get on. And if the left shoe fits I need to wear two or three socks on the right foot! Hopefully this can be resolved soon. What with my ingrowing toenails, Mother Nature wasn’t very kind to me when she gave out feet, was she?
