Top five tips for Hay Festival goers

Richard Booth proclaimed himself King of Hay-on-Wye in 1977

Since the Hay literary festival is still raging on, here are my top tips for who is planning to head down.

1. There are now two festivals at the same time in the small village. Go to both. The Hay festival is the big literary event which is wonderful in terms of talent and scope, if slightly corporate: you can’t imagine the howling Ginsberg of the fifties there but his nineties self would be ‘in conversation’ on a couch. There’s also a philosophy and fun festival, How the Light Gets In at the Globe, a site at the other end of the village. This has a more hippie feel – and the cake is miles better. Not to mention the late night fun. The festivals sandwich the wonderful village and compliment each other.
2. Approach anyone. When I first got there, Rowan Williams was waiting for a bus in the rain, looking very miserable. If that had happened the day after when I was in the groove, I’d have been chatting to him. It may not have cheered him up, but what the hell. The great and the good are at Hay to spark off debate and conversation. They expect to get harassed like never before.
3. Have duck eggs. They might not be on offer; maybe they were my privilege thanks to my wonderful hosts who have ducks. Either way, the countryside there is stunning, so whether it’s a walk up a mountain, some local produce, or time spent looking into the mist, get country-fied.
4. Bring walkie talkies. I had absolutely no reception on o2. Apparently Vodaphone is fine. If you’re in a big group and want regular meet ups, things can get tricky. And if you’re on o2 and want to tweet, forget it. Or change network.
5. Go to the circus near the Castle grounds, it’s fantastic. And walk around the Castle, you might even bump into Richard Booth, the self professed King of Hay-on-Wye. In fact, give yourself time to hang around in the village and its innumerable bookshops. The ‘something special’ about the place originated in the village and blossomed into the festival, not the other way round.

I guess tip five was two tips really, so feel free to forget the duck egg. It could have ended up in a wild ehm… goose chase.

#UKelection and marathon blues

The London marathon was weeks ago, but it’s only today that I’ve stopped. I went from one marathon to another, covering the digital story of the UK elections for the live blog on the BBC site.

Now that the Cabinet is at work, I’ll no longer be going to Westminster in the morning. Despite a new ache in my right hip that materialised post marathon (I never actually had any feeling in my hips before then) I can safely say that all races are over – including the failed one to get my single Running into the charts. And the anti climax is making itself heard.

Japanese writer and marathon fanatic Murkami says he always gets the post marathon blues, a state of sluggishness and depression during which he doesn’t actually feel very much at all. I’ve gone the other over-emotional way, but he’s a man with insight – his advice and experiences carried me the last two miles of the race.

To entertain myself during the marathon, and to dull the pain and relative boredom of running for 4hrs 49, I decided that at mile 20 I would allow my body to become a machine. Murakami does this when he runs an ultra marathon in his autobiographical ‘What I talk about when I talk about running‘. My pal Janie reminded me about this from Australia before the big day, “Remember, one leg forward, other leg forward, it’s all you need to think.”

When mile 20 eventually arrived, I was relieved that I only had six to go but aware that I was entering unchartered territory, a distance I’d never run before. With these exciting thoughts in mind, I told myself I was still human and there was no need to become a machine yet, though I appreciated giving myself the chance.

Four miles later and I needed to become a machine quite urgently. Entertaining myself was no longer an option. My thoughts had dried up and become so tedious that I wanted no part in my usual self. But then I couldn’t think the ‘one step forward, other step forward’ line on loop – a thought for every pace was too hectic, too fast. With the crowds getting louder and louder, giving rise to a false sense of imminent finish, I felt like I needed to breathe deep, block the noise out, keep my head down until the end.

And then it just suddenly floated up into my mind, the other line Murakami uses as his mantra: I am a well oiled machine. While I allowed my body to become a machine living in the present, I repeated it slowly, five steps between each word, locking out the maddening crowd. So that when my friends saw me on the embankment my eyes were “glazed over” until I heard them, ran towards them nearly colliding with a woman dressed for Flamenco – video below courtesy of Karen and Tim, who stood on his toes 40m to spot me (“worse than the marathon,” he said, but given the shirt I wore, probably could have seen me sitting down!).

After this flurry of entertainment, I quickly went back to being a well oiled machine until the finishing line where, full of the emotion emanating from the crowd, I forgot my lack of humanity and started crying, despite everyone around me looking cheerful and relieved.

The next day, another -albeit hobbling – #UKelection day. Working from Westminster, passing the great and the good in the media scrum on the green every morning, witnessing every twist and turn of these hysterical elections online, following their unpredictable unravelling that had the most illustrious and unshakable of BBC political academics, David Cowling, muttering to himself, scratching his beard and shaking his head in disbelief. History in the making.

And now? The blues. I’ll look for a Muddy Waters album and slow down. Shake it off slowly, indulging in it for now. No running for me today.

London Marathon 2010 unofficial song

TWO DAYS ONLY TO GET THE UNOFFICIAL MARATHON 2010 SONG INTO THE CHARTS FOR LEUKAEMIA CARE!

If this song goes into the charts, it will be purely if and because people find themselves reading this and deciding they will invest 79p for Leukaemia Care by buying it on iTunes. I say ‘invest’ because if we manage to get it into the charts, it will get radio play and more sales – the snowball effect will make loads for Leukaemia Care.

Here’s a video explaining why the song is only the Unofficial London Marathon 2010 tune.

It won’t be luck that will get this song into the charts. I’ve had the single launch gig pulled just now – 5 hours before I was due on stage, apparently due to all the other bands dropping out. The ash, broken wrists and general rudeness were quoted.  It was a special gig where I was playing with half the amazing High Wire, one of my favouritest bands and bestest friends, though we found it hard to practice because the weird rehearsal studio, the Joint, pulled our rehearsal the day before.

But the importance is buying this mama this weekend, which you can still do here on iTunes. And you can take a look at the various links on the left of this page to join the facebook group and watch the video.  And download it as a wav file… which is only if you happen to have access to airwaves and would like to play it tomorrow – in that case please do!  My mob is 07952 587443 but… I’ll be Running.

THANK YOU.

Day 2: Getting THIS into the Top 40

Day 2 of the race for the charts and I have my first radio play of Running – with an interview too. It’s for Bradford Community Radio with presenters Dan and Mike. It’s planned to be the last item of DriveTime at 5.45, so I leave work but at 5.35 I’m still stuck in the tube thanks to a signal failure at Blackfriars.

By the time I get out of the tube, I have to hail a cab and I’m pumped up on adrenaline and fear at the thought of missing my first interview for Running – I need to get to a landline, a mobile won’t do. Just as I make it to the phone, after running the last bit of the journey, it starts ringing.

“It’s apt” I think, and I tell Dan and Mike how I’ve done my marathon training for the day. I tell them how I’m trying to get Running into the charts for Leukaemia Care and how I’m racing alongside the song, in the marathon. I’m excited and relieved to have made the interview by the skin of my teeth so I’m chatty and think to myself, “good radio interview”.

Dan and Mike put the song on and say goodbye and good luck. I say goodbye too, but I don’t put the phone down. I’m used to contributors staying on the line in phoneins, or maybe I’m smugly expecting a more personal goodbye.

But all that happens is that I’m suddenly listening in on Dan and Mike having a chat with their mics turned off while Running is playing on the radio. I say Hello? but they can’t hear me – Dan (or is it Mike? I just don’t know) goes “What, she wants to get THIS into the Top 40?!” They laugh and I can’t catch his words but I’m sure the other one, Mike or Dan, is more sympathetic to the cause.

I hang up and stay resolute: Yes Dan and Mike, I want to get THIS into the Top 40. In fact I want it a little bit more now. So thank you for putting it on air, any more plays will be gratefully received.

Running, a race for the charts

Day one of this ruthless race for the charts. The single Running was released almost 12 hours ago and hopefully people will have downloaded it. In fact I think this has something more to do with begging than blogging. The (frankly practically impossible) target is to get it into the Top 40, which would raise a good few grand for Leukaemia CARE who I’m running for. But hey…. it’s tricky (though my publicist seemed very confident to start with, slightly less so now).

So the question is: Will this blog help get Running into the charts?

The answer is, of course, no. But at least I’ve got all my links in one place and I’m not on MySpace.

Just one thing about running (the marathon this time, not the song). I did my last long run yesterday, 10 miles. Frankly, I couldn’t wait for it to be over. But when I finished, I was only a little bit relieved. Quite a big part of me was terrified at the prospect of having finished training. All those missed opportunities, all those times when I should have been running… too late now to make up for it.

I’m sure there’s a lesson in there somewhere, probably one I’ll learn ‘a harder way’ on Sunday.