Monday 22 June 2015

How to lose readers

I know, I know. If you're going to host a blog it's very important to keep posting regularly or your followers will lose interest and wander off to read the offerings of someone more consistent. Epic fail, then, on my part: nothing posted since 12 June and I missed last week's Celebrate the Small Things. Sorry. May I offer the following in mitigation?

I've done a lot of work, including covering some yoga classes at a local gym. More pleasing, on the entertainment front, I've been to see Ivory Yardsale in a Northampton pub; Jez Hellard and Scott Cook, Fabian Holland and Chris Wood (yes, the Chris Wood, folk legend) in the homes of friends; my friend Will in The Hook, the Arthur Miller play that has lain dormant for decades and has been revived for a world premiere run in Northampton; Robin Ince supported by Grace Petrie at the Kettering Arts Centre; and taken part in International Yoga Day celebrations.
Girl power
I went into town on Friday to watch the Women's Tour arrive at the end of stage 3, the longest and hilliest of the event. I know nothing about cycling, but thought I should go and see what it was all about, since it's quite a Big Thing for it to have come to Kettering. As usual, I was torn between taking decent photos and looking at the event IRL: I chose the latter, as a result of which I have lots of pics of half-wheels and blurry heads.

The other thing that has been taking up my time is helping my friend Rachel. She is opening a shop called 'Not Just Words', which will be a bookshop - but so much more. This is worth a whole blog post in its own right, and one will surely follow in due course. Suffice to say for now that a bunch of us have been running up and down stairs with boxes of glorious second books and, would you believe, shifting a piano on to the first floor of her building. There has been a great sense of community and we have enjoyed getting tired and dusty together. Watch this space.

There has, however, been some sadness, since local musician Stevie Poole has died. I didn't know him very well, but I'd seen him perform many times. He will be much missed in our circle.

8 comments:

  1. It sounds like you have been busy. Don't worry about missing a few posts, sometimes daily life has to take a priority. Your friend's shop sounds interesting.

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    1. Thanks, Suzanne. I feel I'm being very indisciplined when I don't write my blog.

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  2. You've been busy enjoying life, Julia, which is more important! Love the sound of your friend's book shop and look forward to hearing more about it.

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    1. Thanks for taking the time to comment, Rosemary.

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  3. Hope the book shop brings lots of fun and good books your way. Look forward to hearing more about it.

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    1. Thanks, Suzy. I shall try not to spend too much time and money there (ahem).

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  4. Look forward to hearing more about your friend's bookshop. And yes, I can believe that piano on the first floor as we have one upstairs at home. It's an old girl and we can't think how we'll ever get it downstairs when we want to replace it. Well, that's given me a subject for a future blog post! I wouldn't worry about a slipping blog post schedule. If I follow someone's blog then I'm happy to read, whenever they post.

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  5. Thanks for stopping by Christine. The best way to shift a piano up and presumably down stairs is to upend it and use a wooden ramp to move it a few steps at a time. That's all there is to it!

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