I am doing it today just as I envisioned! The little red computer is with me. It definitely does add weight to the pack, but it is so worth it. I am now a person who finds places to sit and write while I am out and about so that I can record and process experiences rather than just wait or fill time with social media cruising in between. Nope. Today I am a person who on purpose scheduled break times to write between things because I want that to be part of my life experience. I have always wanted to be this person, looked admiringly at folks who do it, but somehow never have managed to before. Feeling so proud and excited to be myself today.
Last year at Fringe I kept paper notes on every show. Guess what I have to show for it a year later? A notebook full of paper notes that I still hope to decipher some day. Sigh.
This morning was an early morning for me. Up and out by 8:30 am to make the Edinburgh Castle tour at 9:30 am. A thunderstormy morning, grey, chilly and very Scottish. Trusty rain poncho was in my bag so I just went on out to enjoy the weather and my morning. I do wish the Uber app would stop misbehaving. I had to walk half the distance uphill before I could get a ride and probably blew my energy out that I needed to reserve for later in the day.
I’m on my own for the day today, rejoining my party of friends for some evening shows if I have any spoons left. I really like being out on my own, going at my speed, not having to keep track of or please anybody else. It also leaves me brain space and time to process and write rather than talk to other people. Folks always seem to want to do that right after a show and I’m not quite ready. I need to think about it, let the experience sink in. Then I can talk about it. I enjoy the exchange of ideas when it goes deeper, but flooning isn’t usually my thing. At Fringe we are so often on to the next show before I can process the one I just saw so I find myself kinda on the outside of the conversation. Makes me sad sometimes that I can’t quite keep up or don’t enjoy the kind of interaction my friends enjoy. On my own some is good. Writing is good.
I took lots of pictures at the castle. I also tried voice to text to record my thoughts while I was walking around. Maybe I can work some of that into a blog post, but mostly it just wasn’t insightful or interesting. I seem to think better into a keyboard. I’m plenty articulate and can tell a heck of a story and hold up my end of a conversation in select company, but talking to myself in a mic doesn’t seem to be a sweet spot for me. Most of what I recorded today is just going to be trash. Maybe I’ll try again. Perhaps it just takes practice. Or maybe I really want to be present in the experience, absorb and process it, and then write about it afterwards. Yeah, I think that might just be how it is for me. I’m trying stuff and learning.
After the castle I trecked across Edinburgh, a long walk down from the castle to a bustling music venue on the north side of the city. A new area for me, much more local activity and less festival, but there are a few busy venues out this way.
My legs are tired and my feet ache after walking all over the castle and then down here. I’m pretty tired. There will definitely be a ride home after this show, “Orchestra of Sound”. Overall I wanted to get more music onto my schedule for Fringe than I did. Nobody else really wanted to go with me to hear music at least partially because a lot of the music is in venues further out of the center which makes them more challenging to get to. But I do have this one today!
I left plenty of time between castle and show so I got to stop and listen to some free street performances along the way. One guy, Bartek Dabroswski (https://www.bartekdabrowski.co.uk/), playing guitar with some electronic tech to provide rhythm was really good and I bought a couple of his CDs. Looking forward to listening to those when I get home.
I got here early and ate lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe next door to the venue. Sat in a lovely tented gazebo outside where it was dry, breezy and pretty quiet. I wrote show reviews for the first two days that I’ll post as soon as I have internet again. (Those will have date/time stamps that match when the shows happened so if you are interested, go back and read the older posts!) The service was excellent, the burger was abolutely delicious and they were the best onion rings I have ever had bar none. Who knew.
I’m finding sitting down to have proper meals of reasonably familiar food with a little caffiene in what I drink is helping to keep my focus and energy up. Some dollars are going towards that. Yesterday I had the most delicious Spanish tapas at Ste George’s Square; little whole fried fish with lime aoili and skewers of small shrimp + rosemary french fries. Yummy.
Now I’m sitting in a lounge room at the music venue waiting for my show. The recorded music playing in here is really good, but pretty loud. The table next to me overflowing with young people. chatty and also very loud. I’ve got my Loop ear plugs in which helps some but it is pretty overwhelming in here. If I just float in it, don’t try to process the sound, and watch the fluttering green tinsel agsint the black curtain in front of me, it feels like a kind of out of body experience.
Drinking water with electrolytes. Yeah, more to drink.
Time chillin at the Airbnb for a few hours to put my feet up and post writing will be happening late this afternoon. Shutting down the puter for now. More later.
Addendum
Uber app continues to be overloaded or unhappy in some way such that I cannot summon rides. Got a very nice hotel doorman to get me a cab so I got home. No way I could have made the 35 minute walk back on my feet. I am now in possession of a card for the cab company so they’ll get some of my business.