Wednesday 20th September 2006

Morning train to London to get some Global Hangover stuff sorted out. I’ve got a load of old train tickets on the sideboard and hopefully looked through them for a return to London that I might have acquired when travelling up in the last month. See, it’s a pound more to get a return than a single so if I’m in London and I need to get to Liverpool I’ll get a return which is valid for month. I found one, remarkably, so although this meant sitting in standard class (which as discussed last week is perfectly fine and comfortable until you’ve travelled in first class which then makes it feel like youth hostel) I felt I was getting the journey for free, which in a way I was. This made it more comfortable.

Drew out the Muller ad on the way down and I’m quite happy with it, but that’s for later. Met my Dad in The Ship on Wardour Street and he’s really going to be a big help in getting this project ship shape. Mum too, because she runs a business, and I’ll have to get her advise, but for today Dad offered some really good pointers and mapped things out on paper. What helps is that he really likes the idea and wants to see it work, so there’s a drive and enthusiasm. I think if I said ‘I want to set up a silver mine below the River Mersey’ he’d be able to spell out the first steps, but knowing it’s a rubbish idea, not be able to put together a proper plan. With this idea, which is about as ambitious as a silver mine under the Mersey but rather more possible, he can tell me how to go about it.

It’s amazing the people you see wandering about in Soho. You keep having that awkward feeling of seeing someone you know and trying desperately to think where you know them from in case you make eye contact and they come over to say hello, before realising you saw them in some drama or comedy on the TV last week. Everyone’s an actor, a producer, a runner, or a courier. You see lots of famous faces too. When my Dad was outside the pub on his phone, Peter Stringfellow walked past him. It was interesting to see my Dad and Peter Stringfellow together, and looking at them both, I knew very defiantly which one is the best Father.

Sorry Dad, but it would be great to be Peter Stringfellow’s son. Can you imagine? I am kidding.

I was delighted to walk past Karl Pilkington, the star of Ricky Gervais’ Podcasts. I’ve listened to most of these and you’d be wise to find out about Karl if you’re not yet in the loop. He’s something of a science experiment and I think he’s fascinating. It’s possible, as some people have cynically suggested, that he’s a comedy character and not really as stupid as he makes out, but I’m not sure… Gervais insists he’s real. I believe him because if he was a character, he’d be the best character ever, and therefore one of the best comedy actors ever. We’d have heard about him before. He was the producer of Ricky Gervais’ XFM show, he was just handed to them one day to press buttons, they didn’t know him, and they found out immediately that as soon as he opened his mouth such fantastical nonsense, of the most baffling kind, would spill out. So they sort of kept him as a pet and he became the show. Go listen.

Eventually we met up with A and Steve in The Running Horse on Davies Street before Dad had to get a train back down to Kent and to home. I love the idea of one day getting Global Hangover to the point where Dad could join it. He’d sort out so many problems and cover so many manholes that Wade and I would otherwise wander naively into. We will fall down a lot of manholes in the first few months I’m guessing.

Perhaps it would be an idea to write some sort of stupid business book about setting up a business called ‘Manholes’ that entrepreneurs can buy in W.H.Smiths at airports and read on the plane. I’ve seen lots of business men sat on planes reading these sorts of books. ‘The Art Of Work’ and stuff like that. I even bought one once. It was rubbish. It told you to shine your shoes and have a good hair cut. I believe a youth of today might use the words ‘Well, DUH!’ It’s obvious you should shine your shoes and have a good hair cut. I stopped reading it after a while but there was probably a chapter that said not to fart in the face of you bosses wife if you’re after that big promotion.

Although maybe ‘Manholes’ isn’t the best title? Perhaps ‘How Not To Look Like A Prannet In Workplace’. Or ‘How to win. I said WIN.’

Although no-one has the slightest interest in The Power Of 10 (God, how long did that take me as well?) I’d love to do a spoof book about work. There are so many that might as well be spoofs. Nah, not got the time. I can’t have a new project per day. Perhaps I could if I read ‘How To Have A New Project A Day And Win, I Said WIN’ by A.A. Abrahams. That book probably exists too.

Suggestions for poor quality motivational books to the normal address.

I was in two minds what to do this evening, I was tired, and A had offered me accommodation, but on the other hand it was Wade’s club night, Rakehells, at the Grill Room at The Café Royal and whilst it was only proper I should support that, there was an extra incentive to go.

You may remember I was quite recently talking about a girl called Lily Farthing? Wade, Aria and I went to the South Bank to try and find her if you recall? I believe I also said something about how she would be my wife, despite never having met her.

Well, Lily Farthing was booked to perform at Rakehell’s this evening. I think only a fool and a wally would turn down the opportunity to meet her and so I bid A and Steve goodnight, went back to Wade’s flat to change into the white tuxedo (this is coming in handy, it was a good investment) and returned to the wonderful Grill Room.

As I entered, I saw the ever-extraordinary David Piper standing by the DJ Booth, supervising the music that was, at that moment, I believe Chopin. I like a club where you go in and hear the sounds of piano, 20’s jazz, or swing. It’s a heady time warp, and quite another thing entirely to the clubs which play ‘electronic’ music. I don’t go to those clubs. David greeted me with a hug and told me to turn around. I did, and saw the vision of Lily Farthing turning, in a statuesque but flowing pose, on a revolving platform in the middle of a mechanical flower. It was quite mesmerising.

After her performance I was introduced to her, but for the first time since I was about seven I found myself short of conversation, felt stupid and inarticulate, not to mention boring, and eventually excused myself, walking towards the toilet thinking ‘You’re an idiot, McHale, an idiot good and true.’

But still, I’ve met her. She’s out of my league. It’s funny, I’ve met lots of people you could describe as ‘famous’, some very much so, I’ve met lots of people I admire, I’ve never had much of a hang-up talking with the fairer sex, but Lily (or Anna, as that is her name) completely threw me off balance. She has a quiet voice, suitably, for such a delicate creature, and I often found myself straining to hear her which meant asking her to repeat almost everything whilst leaning my ear in, which just makes you look a prat. I would like to take her to lunch somewhere by the river, that might me more suitable.

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