Time gentlemen please

Bad news - it wasn't 'a bit of a cold' it was manflu, that most terrible of illnesses. Many are the ladies that say that manflu doesn't exist, but they are of course sadly deluded - I didn't feel too bad on Monday but by Tuesday I was in it's evil clutches with a headache from hell, all sorts of nasty stuff pouring out of my nose and a voice that sounded like I'd been gargling with paint stripper. Not good frankly. After taking mountains of paracetamol and drinking gallons of water (I only exaggerate a couple of million times a day) throughout Tuesday and Wednesday I heroically dragged myself down to The Crown And Sceptre for the Good For Nothing performance by Scott from Balcony Shirts - as I stumbled around trying to plug my acoustic guitar into the P.A. system Scott asked me if I would like to play on the whole set rather than just the bread and Q.P.R. songs as we'd originally planned. I thought I'd said something like 'I would if I was feeling better, and anyway I don't know your songs' although I think I actually said something more like ' Argh were ef Iwa fellin bitter' then coughed for about 40 seconds; either way he played a couple of his own songs (and very good they were too) before beckoning me up to join him. The bread song went well before he introduced another of his own songs -pausing to say 'it's just C, F and G with a capo at the second fret' to your humble narrator he launched into a song that I'd not heard before. After listening to the first verse I started with a few tentative notes; by about halfway through I'd more or less got the hang of it and would have tried a few more bits than I did if my nose hadn't started running during the last verse. Then he started strumming with the words 'Chas And Dave' - I recognised 'Ain't No Pleasing You' but made a dreadful mess of the chord sequence. Bah! Still never mind, it's time for the Q.P.R. song, he's changed the key (actually come to think of it he changed the key to the bread song too!) but I can play this one and it ends to cheery applause. Excellent. Even though I'm feeling rough (did I mention that I had manflu?) it was good fun although it would have been good to have been familiar with the other songs. Still if I've learned anything from playing this music lark it's that once you've made a mistake then it's gone forever and there's not much point in worrying about it. Time for a drink then...

'Last orders at the bar'.

The manager (I think he's the manager, he seemed to be running the place) walked around to tell everybody personally. It was just after 10.30. We hadn't been that bad had we? Mind you there weren't many people in... looks like I'd attended the only two Good for Nothing club nights at the Crown And Sceptre. Shame. Oh well, it might be a good thing to go home early, after all I'm not feeling too well... as I was leaving Darren thanked me for playing then added 'Simon bootlegged it'. Bugger! What was that I was saying about mistakes being gone forever?

P.S. - I found out on Saturday morning that they will be carrying on with the club night on Wednesdays after all - good news!