Revenge is Sweet

Heard D pull a plate from under other crockery, plate hit the deck and smashed. Under much mutting and tutting, D took dustpan and brush from cupboard, again dragging it past our huge tub of parroty foods, sunflower seeds etc. The whole tub upended in the cupboard into shoes. I sat oblivious typing away on the computer

D "That`s right, you just sit there!!!"
Y "Yes, thanks I will."
He swept up some of it, then got the hoover out. Yes, I remember when you stood watching me scour up the soap suds.
D "That cupboard is a mess."
Y "Well, you can tidy it if you want to. So, it`s my fault that the cupboard is untidy, it made you drop the plate did it?"
D "Humpfff"

As I said, revenge is sweet.

At Lorna Windham`s book launch,Breaking Point, one of her short stories was featured in Tales from the Inner Cities, a Ragepacket volume produced by Byker Books. She is a writer to watch out for. Just when I think that I have sussed what is going to happen, I haven`t, love that, twists and turns. Sheila Quigley there with her new book Living on a Prayer and Andy Rivers with his punchy style.


Sunday at the meeting of acts in the pink lane poetry event on Thursday 12th. We met in the old post office building, what a fabulous old place, I`d love to live somewhere like that. Robbie Hurst, James Oates, Simma, Jazz singer Margaret Frayne, Bish (Photographer) and Jess, the producer there. We called in to the Jazz Club to view where we would be performing. Original carpets, old style till and radio, fabulous old sofa`s. Simma left earlier as he had a gig on the quayside to perform his music. His first book was a sell out at the launch Last Night I Married the Audience, he has done brilliantly for his first book with Zebra, will go into second edition already.

Handed over 42,700 words, the captions and 250 photos to the publisher today, what a relief,only the acknowledgements page to complete. Now I can concentrate on writing again. But, I have become really interested in collecting the memories of our Benwell senior citizens and will continue to do this out of interest. Everyone has photos in their homes, waiting to be scanned and put into the West Newcastle Picture History Collection. We were there as usual in the new library from 9.30-12 and a few more residents who I spoke to last week in shops in the area called in. They thoroughly enjoyed talking about old times and looking through the collection. J H joked

"I was part of a big family, we all used the same bath water and I was last in. I was dirtier when I came out of the bath than I was when I went in." Magic.