Saw Bill Bailey live in Bristol last night. It was everything I expected it to be and more. I laughed a lot and was not bored for even one second. Bill was on top form, and it was great to be sat out in the fresh air (the chairs were laid out on the lawn of Ashton Gate Football Stadium). It was fun when he remarked on the surprisingly beautiful weather (Something like "This is all very weird...sunshine in England in the summer..."), the moon in the sky, and also a seagul that randomly flew past. Bill got a standing ovation at the end of the set. Everybody loved him. It was a real homecoming gig for him, since he grew up in the area. What's always amazing about Bill though, is how he makes it all look so easy and effortless. He's just a naturally funny guy who also happens to be a virtuoso musician, and he combines the two seamlessly.

There were five of us who went to the gig together: Me, Dan, American Mark, American Mark's English Girlfriend, and American Mark's English Girlfriend's Friend (also English). At the end of the gig, Mark (who is from New York City and has a cheeky mischievous face) was trying to pursuade us to all pile into a Taxi ("Google says it's 4 miles all the way back to Dan's house..."). Dan said he didn't mind (typical Dan, hates the possibility of ever causing offense or upset to anyone, and so hence always refuses take responsibility for any decision making). Mark said to me, "Right, so make a decision," so I said, "Umm, okay, we'll walk and save money." Mark and the two women went to the Taxi while Dan and me started walking (along with thousands of other people) in the general direction of the city centre. It took us about 75 minutes to get back to Dan's house, but the time flew really quickly because we talked so much. I can talk for England if I'm on a subject I'm interested in and I'm talking to someone who doesn't interrupt much (and Dan doesn't like to interrupt much, because he seems to have a constant fear of causing any kind of offence ot anyone). If the conversation subject is something I'm not interested in, or the person likes to interrupt a lot, I can't talk for England, I talk for Japan instead, like an English person who doesn't know any Japanese and therefore doesn't say anything. I'm not sure this joke really works. Most of the time my jokes only make sense to me and nobody else, but this joke, I'm not even sure I understand it either. By the way, that last bit is what I would classify as "the kind of joke that only makes sense to me and nobody else". If it made sense to you, and you're female and under the age of about 35, we need to talk. It could be that we're meant to fall in love or something. I don't know. I don't really understand how these things work.

Anyway...

Drove back to Bristol today, to catch up on something I started. Let me explain...

I had the idea back in April to celebrate the entire Month of June as a Birthmonth, rather than settling for just one day as a Birthday. My idea was, that I would try to pack as many fun activities into the 4 weekends of June that I could. My plan was, half of the activities would be exciting activities with friends, and the other half would be more relaxed solitary activities such as art galleries, museums, etc.

The first weekend it was Mountain Biking with friends followed by a trip to Berkley Castle by myself. Last weekend it was Go Ape (organised tree climbing) with friends followed by visiting 4 different art galleries in Bristol. It turned out that one of the art galleries didn't have an exhibition on last weekend, but they did this weekend, so today I went back there to see it. I saw that one of the attendants (a young woman) seemed to look at me once or twice, so I went over to speak to her ("Did you make any of these pieces?..."). I wanted to speak to her again after I'd gone round that part of the gallery, but she has disappeared after that, so when I got home I found her website, and now I'm going to stalk her until I get arrested.

Anyway, it was all very interesting. Lots of alternative stuff. Lots of weird sound and video things, and various moving objects. Worth the walk across the city, I reckon. But then that's all part of it, the urban hiking. As a country boy who claims to be forever in love with the rural life (including, but not limited to, hiking, tree climbing, trespassing and scaring sheep), urban hiking is like a secret pleasure of mine.

Anyway, that's not the end of my day. I was back at my car by 3pm, and drove to Bath to visit the Victoria Art Gallery. The downstairs gallery of new stuff was close (it seems to be a bit of a lottery sometimes, this art gallery thing), but the upstairs gallery of old paintings was open, so I went up there. I spotted one painting which I was sure I'd seen somewhere else recently. I couldn't decide whether I'd seen it in a gallery in Bristol, or in a dream I had. I was so disturbed by this, I walked all the way back across the room and asked the member of staff if it was a copy. Half way through her comprehensive reply regarding which pieces had copies and which didn't (this particular one didn't, she said) I suddenly realised I had probably seen it on the website that morning before I came.

After that, I walked around Bath for a bit, around the River and stuff. It was fucking excellent weather! I don't normally like to swear when I'm not angry (and even then I prefer to stay away from the F-word, opting instead for safer words such as cunt), but the weather really was that good. Sat on a bench next to the river, and tried to become as conscious as possible of the experience of a perfect summer day in a beautiful city. This picture doesn't even come close...

Next weekend is Crazy Golf and Cycling...