Day 29 - Community Hall, Mallaig, Monday 3rd November

I was having a nice lie in when I was rudely awakened by Lee who wanted to collect my Travelogue. Woke up in the middle of the night and Struan wasn’t there, I was confused. Wasn’t until later I found out he’d gone for breakfast. Got up had a shower, very nice. Got breakfast and went to do the Get In. Unfortunately it was raining. I had to put my Beanie on, very fetching, shows off my big nose. Dead easy Get In, two doors, so we managed to unload both vans at the same time. Got in, vocally the place not too much of a challenge. That was cool. Struan and I were wandering around looking for something to eat. Found a place, it was cracking, and waitresses were very attractive. Fleur and Beth caught up with us, had fish suppers for lunch.Went back to the hotel. Played football on the computer. John Langford wanted to see my computer. He got royally humped cos I’m sooooo good. We went to get dinner. We couldn’t find anywhere, so we went back to the same place we had lunch. Had this fantastic steak. It cost £15. A fillet steak with haggis on top and creamy mushroom sauce. Best steak I’ve ever had, totally worth the money.

Went to do the show. Doing my warm up blah, blah, blah…. Started doing the scene. Again there were reflective doors all along the back wall. I could see myself reflected back.  I positioned myself so that I was always on a doorframe and couldn’t see myself. This was a very interesting show. There were these kids in the front row. They were quite well behaved for the first act but in the second act they were talking normal child talking volume. They were really distracting, we all had to talk over them. Eventually when Alan Steele was on for his Ebenezer scene, in character he said "What’s that noise?" directly to the kids. He had to do something, did it really cleverly. We did the show. The audience loved it .

Then we went to a bar (at the restaurant we went to on Sunday). They had a pool table. The beer was flowing. We toddled on home. I played football on my computer and I went to bed.
 

Day 30 - Sabhal Mor Ostaig, Isle of Skye, Tuesday 4th November

Very funny bizarre day. Struan and I slept in! We had to get the ferry. We had decided to set the alarm for 7.30am. We were going to do the Get In when we got there. We woke at five to eight. We managed to get packed. The ferry didn’t leave till 8.40am. It was now five past eight. Struan had taken the van to the ferry port. The wind was going wild. I’m walking down this road with all my bags. I met Alan McPherson , “Where is the ferry?”. It was all very stressed. I tried to put my things into the van but the wind was blowing the door shut. So I’m trying to fight against the door and the wind. Got in the van and when I looked forward at the Luton, in front of us, it was rocking from side to side, fully loaded. We got onto the ferry. The sea was sooo rough.  Lindsey threw up. Got there. Got lost. Got there. I totally realised that we were at a Gaelic college. People were going to know if we were saying things right in the play. Did the Get In. The Wind was blowing the flats all over the place. We went to our rooms. Our rooms were actually the halls of residence. They run it as a mini guest house- it was quality. It was this round tower, six storeys high. The rooms were segments of the tower. Each one was cracking with a lovely shower. Went for lunch, had a shower. Read Lord of the Rings and passed out for ages. I was really tired. So I kind of came to from my sleep. It was ten past five. As far as I was concerned dinner was half past five till half past six. So I’m sitting in my room thinking I’ll go down in about quarter of an hour. I got a call from Lindsey, “If you want to get dinner you have five minutes”. We both pummelled down to the kitchen. I had fish pie, which they supplied for us. Went to do the show, Alan Steele has the cold again. I had to run back for his Vicks Vapour Rub. I gave him my Beechams Powders 'cos I’m that sort of guy.

So the first line of the entire show, I mucked up. I came on slightly too fast. The show starts with Alan Brecks’ voice in a recording - "David Balfour of Shaws" is said five times, the music stops and I come in with my line. But because I was early I miscounted and chopped the David Balfour off the beginning of my line. A very different beginning to the play. I thought from that moment on it was going to be horrible but it was a really good show. Really energised. But when it came to a third of the way through the play, the characters started to speak Gaelic. I was totally aware of how nervous people were. I wanted to laugh especially at the Hector scene. I was really aware the audience knew exactly what we were saying.  At the Interval this guy brought us some tea. I joked "A beer would be nice", turns out that wine and beer had been left for us for after the show! Everyone was sitting in this little room. Lindsey and I play fought. She got the better of me, I have a bad shoulder at the moment. Then John Langford started beating me up. It was John Langford’s birthday. We got him a Cd and a card. When we did our bows the audience were going wild. Will we go on for a third bow? They kept clapping and clapping. Then we went up to the fifth floor with our beer and wine etc and watched football highlights. I had my first ever Murphys, it was really nice. So we watched the football blah, blah, blah….I stayed up til two o'clock reading Lord of the Rings. Then I went to bed.
 

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