Day Four - Aberdeen, Arts Centre, Thursday 9th October
 
Struan and I skipped breakfast and slept on.  We had an unexpected tour of Aberdeen as we got lost, it's all one way. The roads are beautiful, the scenery quite nice. When we got there the art centre was up a spiral staircase. There was a lot of grumpy people. Everything took ages, we didn't finish getting set up 'till almost 4 o'clock. A lot of people got injured: banging into doors , doing their backs in.... Not one of my favourite days, but things will pick up. I had hoped to got to the pictures. There was no hot water where I was staying to have a shave. There was a smaller but appreciative audience. They seemed to really enjoy it. At one point the lightning flashes came in as if in negative - strange effect. After the show Struan and I had a pizza.

Hopefully it can't get much worse than Aberdeen although Aberdeen itself is a great place.
 

Day Five – Dunfermline, Carnegie Hall. Friday 10th October

On way to Dunfermline with Struan, god bless his patience. We stopped at Perth Theatre to pick up some stuff. Nice to be in my in my home town again but annoying that I couldn’t go home. I enquired about a job crewing at the panto over Christmas. The drive was dead easy. When we pulled up outside the Carnegie hall there was a huge banner with Steeley (Alan Steele, actor playing Ebenezer) and my mugs on it and Kidnapped in large letters, quite random!

Dunfermline is quite nice, lovely, clean and quite big.  I went to a cool pub and had a burger with pepperoni and cheese. The get in was really easy and the get out was 50min! Our hotel had a bar so aftershow was sorted. Went to the cinema and saw Nemo- cracking! I have been trying to go for three days. To get there I had to walk outside Dunfermline thru a little village across the bypass. I just got there in time to see the film.

Popped in to get some chips and got picked up the moment I got back leaving no time for a sit down. The performance went well. It now runs fast, a lot smoother, flowing really well .Nearly sweltering as the radiators were turned up. John Langford (actor plays Hoseason) had to cut one of his wigs. The weather is nice, we are not in the north east now, though got a bit chilly in the night. Read some of the feedback from the audiences so far, all really positive, loved the set and the music. On one form it said “nice one Fitzy” which is a nickname from school that I hate. No idea who had travelled to see me.
 

'Kidnapped' book jacket

 Day Six - Stonehaven, Town Hall. Saturday 11th October

Ok journey. Got into Stonehaven, couldn’t find the Town Hall. Ended up at the railway station. Turned around, saw this guy, asked him the way to the "toon haal" (as he said). He showed us. It was covered in scaffolding on the main road. I thought that there must be a back way in so told Struan to turn right down this lane which turned out to be one way to the sea! Too narrow to turn round. Stop, stop, stop! Had to reverse straight out. I was laughing so hard I nearly… Struan was really angry.
 

The get in was quite easy. Our hotel turned out to be near the railway station. We new the way! Really nice, the owner used to be a journalist and had lots of photos of old time movie stars up in his dinning room. Some of us went to the pub to watch the football, cracking game. We screamed when Fletcher scored then remembered to watch our voices – so professional. Then I had a steak which cost a lot of money. There were no showers, I used all the hot water having a bath leaving none for Struan. The show was sold out. We got up to the bit where I knock on the door of the House of Shaws and the lights went out.

I thought a queue had been mucked up, didn’t know what to do. We had to keep going, but no one could see us. Then Fleur made an announcement that we had lost the power and stopped the show. Turned out to be a faulty fuse box. Sandy (Sandy Maxwell, NEAT) had to sit by the fuse box and keep shoving the blown ones back in. It turned out to be a really good show. Steeley said it made us more human. Felt like we were all in it together. Some kids really wanted to meet the actors after the show and there were some teary eyes in the front row. Nice place and people.

Despite everything that happened a good end to the week. Looking forward to Ullapool.
 

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