THOUSANDS OF HOLES

I still don’t think I’m very well.

Of course, racing around the country won’t help. It was another barn dance gig last night; this time somewhere near Portsmouth, in a building with 33,792 holes in the ceiling.

Ventilation, I think. And yes, between tunes while staring at the roof.

The M27 was closed on the way back and I had to put my legendary navigation skills into practice to get home. My phone died somewhere in deepest Hampshire at around midnight, so I pointed the car in roughly the right direction and hoped for the best.

It had been a long day. Early morning walk with Paul and a decent breakfast in Café St Louis. That had been followed by The Turning in a sunny Forbury Gardens, a long coffee with my sister in the hipster-hub that calls itself Workhouse Coffee, and a brief equipment check of the Nord Stage 2 EX. Then I left for the gig as the sun started its descent over the motorway.

I feel a bit queasy. That’s not quite the right word but it’s the closest. I’m upside-down, weak and watery, like there’s an achey exhaustion I’ve convinced myself might be normal and have pushed through. And weirdly I can’t work out whether any of that is physical. It’s a muddle alright.

The holes were tiny. They were arranged in groups of six, like tally chart markers. Then, the groups of six were grouped into sixteens in squares of four by four. Along the ceiling there were twenty two columns by eight rows of sixteens. And that was duplicated on each side of the roof. Thousands of holes. For ventilation.

Maybe just open a window.

I got back home at 1:30am. The moon was high and bright and stars sparkled in the ice-cold sky. I was tired and queasy. The street was silent. I clicked open the front door and flicked on the light switch. Nothing happened.