Another Year Older...

Good King Hal, blowing a raspberry on Sarah Morris' face in front of the Houses of Parliament while sipping proseco. A novel way of protesting.

February 26th - my birthday.  My 47th birthday this time around.  47?  There must be some mistake!  I can't be that old...  When my dear late lamented grandfather, the near legendary Charles Mee, was 93 years old, I was having lunch with him one day, and I asked him a question I was dying to know.  As we sat in Tomassi's, the Italian restaurant in Southend in Essex, I asked him how old he felt inside - without thinking, how old did you actually feel.  He thought for briefest of moments and then said "about 45".  However, he did say he felt that young until he was walking down the street, and paused to look in the shop window, and wondered who the doddery old fool was staring at him, until he realised it was his own reflection.  I know exactly where you're coming from Grandad.  I am very handsome until I look in a mirror.  Mind you, at the age of 93 I soon realised why my Grandfather had cantered down to this Italian restaurant so quickly - it was all the tall leggy brunette waitresses.  I did tease him about this, and my Grandfather, being one of the last great Edwardian gentlemen (i.e. sex or anything regarding women was not spoken about in public) blushed a little and then said: "Well, the day you stop looking you might as well give up."  Wise words indeed.

For my 47th Birthday I took a near last minute decision to head to Southampton and meet up with two old friends from my years working at Skandia Life, now some 11 years in my past.  Therefore I was at the Tavernetta restaurant and meeting up with Ruth Le Mesurier and Sue Marsh, and we had a lovely time.  The years just rolled away and it as almost like we had never been apart from each other.  The meal was lovely, as was the large glass of Merlot.  All too soon it was time to part, and before I headed back to the NCP to take out a mortgage and pay for my parking, I popped into Skandia House and saw the lovely Sue Plumb on reception, and saw old chums from security Ian Fitzpatrick and Trevor Allery.  Very little had changed, Trevor had slightly fewer teeth and marbles, but not much else.  I also saw a young lady called Fern (your surname - I regret Madam, I have forgotten, forgive an old fart) who's telephone I used to repair on a regular basis on my days at Skandia.  This happy stroll down amnesia lane over, I was soon in the car and on my way home.

Thursday 27th February, it's time to go back to being Henry.  I drove up to the village of Cheddar and a first visit to Fairlands School.  It was a big group, of about 180 year six children, but such a lovely group, it was a delight to work with them.  This was one of the finest schools I have visited for a long time.  I had got the job through a contact at the school who knew people at Hugh Sexey School at Wedmore.  We had a truly memorable day, great fun all the way through, and culminated in one of the most memorable jousts in a long time.  The final was incredibly close, it was down to the last rider on both teams, the boys seemed to just about hold the whip hand, when the last lady knocked the final quintaine she was at very badly - her final quoit catapulted up into the air and all looked lost.  But this girl was good and coolly skewered the quoit in mid air with her lance and galloped home for a remarkable victory.  Astounding.

GENTLEMEN 12.5 - 21.5 LADIES

That could be it already lads.  Surely no way back from there.  The drive back home took me south past Glastonbury and Somerton, and on one last high patch of ground I looked west across the levels of Somerset and saw.... a sea.  It was like looking out across some vast inland sea.  The floods were still out in force, that was for sure.

I went to see my mate Pete Flanagan in Tatworth on the Friday.  He asked me a small favour... could I drive off and collect some more music memorabilia for him.  No problem Pete, where do you want me to go?  Oh... Southampton, again.  So two days after driving down to Southampton to see everyone at Skandia, I was in Pete's BMW driving back to Southampton to meet his mate and collect some signed Jimmy Page posters.  Boy, I lead an exciting life sometimes.

Friday night was a special night as it was Matthew Applegate's official farewell bash at Barrington Court.  It started at 6.30pm and I arrived about five minutes late to find the whole place heaving with people.  This just went to see how popular Matthew was, and also at how deep the anger is felt by all the people at Barrington for the way the complete tossers in the National Trust management have treated him.  First Matthew made a fine, sweet, amusing speech.  It was touching, not maudlin and was just right.  Then Matt's lovely wife Sue stood up to make a speech.  Barely holding back her tears and anger she delivered a stunner.  One of the most moving speeches I have ever heard.  There was barely a dry eye in the house.  I was delighted to be recounted a story by one of the volunteers who told me the previous week they had been summoned to the Court House for the pre-season briefing.  The man mainly responsible for Matthew's demise, a loathsome creature by the moniker Turner, delivered his attempt at a rousing gee up speech for the masses - and sat down to a deafening silence.  One of the other managers was making their address when they happened to mention Matthew's name - this caused a spontaneous and sustained round of applause to burst out among the people in the room.  Wonderful.

We had a lovely time, laughing and joking with Matthew and all his wonderful staff.  It was great to see Rachel Brewer again for the first time since her baby Oscar was born.  Old deputy Visitor Services Managers to Matthew, Tamsin and Toria turned up - one from Cornwall and one all the way from York, just to see Matthew.  That is the respect in which this man is held.  NT management will find out one day.

I've had a lovely relaxing weekend watching Manchester City win the League Cup for the first time since 1976, which was great fun.  And now it's back to the daily grind.  And all I've got to look forward to now is my 48th birthday.  Oh, and ogling women of course.  As my Grandfather said - once you stop looking, you might as well give up.  Good work, that fellow!

Billericay Dicky and the Tudor Revels

An early version of the Tiller Girls.  Not a raging success.

After all the ridiculous hammering up and down the M4, it was nice to spend a couple of slightly more restful days in Essex with my ex wife Amanda and my lovely son, James.  They have both been offered roles in an am dram production of "A Christmas Carol", with Amanda playing one of the old crones who sells off all of Scrooge's wares after he has died in the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come bit (and I refuse to make any comments about type casting, really), and James is playing the little boy that Scrooge asks to go and buy a turkey for Bob Cratchitt on Christmas morning.  I helped them with a couple of read-throughs before their latest rehearsal, and they were both near word perfect already!  James is going to be a star, I can tell, and his Mum isn't too shabby in the acting stakes either!

The Friday morning had me returning to one of my favourite schools in Essex - South Green Junior in Billericay.  I was warmly welcomed as ever by the lovely staff, and had another pleasant experience shortly before I was due to start my show by the appearance of my dear old friend Kevin Rowley!  He runs a company called Comprehensive Piano Services, and one of his jobs is to look after the servicing and tuning of all the pianos in the state schools of Essex and beyond.  He was there to re-fit a pedal on South Green's upright which had come off at high speed during a particularly violent interpretation of Grieg's Piano Concerto.  This is of course completely made up, I have no idea how the pedal came off, but off it was, and Kevin was the man for the job.  We had a little chat, but just as we really got cracking the children arrived for their morning and Kevin had to shoot off.  Well we had a great day with the children - tremendous fun, full of laughs and much noise.  Lunch was as ever served by the charming lady at South Green who does the food there - what a nice person she is! And then we were back for a mad afternoon, culminating in a very loud joust which the boys managed to win.  So our score clicks over to the slightly surreal score of:

GENTLEMEN 3.5 - 5.5 LADIES

I packed my stuff away and headed back to Amanda's house.  I offered to take James out to dinner that evening with his Mum, anywhere that he wanted.  The choice was his.  The Ivy?  Claridges?  The Fat Duck?  Nope.  He chose - Pizza Hut, as ever.

I was up early the next morning for the drive from Essex down to Southampton and my appearance at the event called "Meet the Ancestors" run by a local historical group in Southampton called The Tudor Revels.  I was bound to get the coffee one.  I was due to give another outing to my "Henry's Horrid History" show. I set off round the M25 in high spirits, but it was bound not to last.  Warnings began being broadcast on the radio stating that the M25 was shut in both directions by the M23 due to a massive pile up and traffic was at a standstill.  I plumbed in a detour route on my sat nav, but the stupid machine kept trying to take me back to the M25.  Anyway, I ended up cutting right across country in grey lowering weather, with pretty much everybody else appearing to try the same thing as I got held up in ever slower traffic jams on what I would imagine are normally quite charming A roads.  Arundel looked nice, if gridlocked, and I made a note to pop back and visit sometime when I wasn't in a hurry.  In the end a two hour drive from Basildon to Southampton ended taking nearly 4 hours.  I had been given directions to a nearby primary school to the venue where performers could park their cars in safety.  I arrived at the school two hours late to find the gates securely locked and not a sign of any one in sight.  I drove round to the little Tudor side street where the event was taking, nearly wiping out the town crier and the wise woman on the bonnet of my Mazda.  One of the organisers popped over to the car park and let me in, which was very sweet of her.  I had told lots of my old Skandia friends that I was appearing in Southampton (Skandia Life being a company I worked for in Southampton between 1998 and 2003 - just in case you haven't read past blog entries), and I was delighted to see some familiar faces!  First off there was Camilla Kennedy, who I hadn't seen since I left Skandia, then there was Kathryn Lee, up until this point the only person from my Skandia days to see me perform as Henry as she, her mum and her daughter came out to Barrington Court one weekend a couple of years ago to see me, which was really sweet of her!  And then there was the lovely Tracie Callaway-Sayce, her husband and two kids, again, someone I had not seen since 2003.  You can see the four of us all together in the Tiller Girl pose in the photo above.  We are, left to right, Camilla, Kathryn, Some old Tudor ruin, and Tracie.  Then I bumped into the gorgeous Sarah Morris, who was there at the show giving a talk about her books and signing copies.  Great to see her again.  Such a lovely lovely lady.  Well I was doing my show in St Julien's Chapel (not Sandy's) and we were packed out!  Staff on the doors were turning people away which was a shame for them, but most gratifying.  The show went down a storm - I chose Camilla to play Anne Boleyn and took great delight in chopping her head off - only pretend of course.  When I finally finished the show and went outside all three ladies were waiting to see me, and I was roundly hugged and congratulated.  Then along came dear old Graham Orris (Or Goff as we know him!), again late of Skandia, with his wife and children - they had been one of the groups who had arrived too late to gain access to the show.  Poor lad.  After some lovely goodbyes from the Skandia crew, I walked back to the car park with Sarah Morris, had a cuddle and goodbye from her, which was very nice, and then began the long slog back to Somerset.  The drive back was fine and I finished  the evening with a nice bottle of wine and some lovely memories of seeing such lovely old friends again.

About the most exciting things that have happened this week have been getting my car MOT'd, which amazingly it passed (!!!!!!) and then getting some of my costume repaired by the sainted Judy Hares in Martock.  Back on the road again this week with visits to Bromsgrove and Preston.  Thank God for that MOT.

OI! SNOW! NO!!

Captain Robert Falcon Scott (left) pondering on whether the antarctic frock he has chosen for "Birdy" Bowers (right) is up to the rigours of a south polar winter and a diet of pemmican...

My world record attempt to drive the furthest distance to as many shows as possible in the space of three weeks continued.  And to choose to do it during the depths of winter?  Surely I want locking up...  By the end of my first journey on Monday morning, I would whole heartedly have agreed.  Monday morning saw me getting up at 5am in Maidstone for a shortish drive to Dulwich College Junior School in South East London.  Now as you know, I hate driving in London and would much rather drive to a school there in the wee small hours, park outside the school and sleep in the car until the place opens, then go in and introduce myself.  That was the plan for Monday.  But the best laid plans of mice and Tudor despots can go a bit Pete Tong if the weather is against you, and this morning, it was.  It had snowed on the Sunday night, but hadn't settled too badly.  As I made my way up the M20 towards London I made very good progress, but then we got onto the South Circular and things began to slow down.  First of all, a heavily over ladened flat bed truck, piloted by some pikey looking types tried to squeeze through a too narrow space next to a Romanian lorry - the pikey promptly loses his side rear view mirror - and his temper.  He chases the Romanian lorry, then carves him up before slamming on his brakes in front of him forcing him to stop, before jumping out of the van to confront the driver.  I drove round them before any "unpleasantness" ensued.  The snowfall got heavier and the traffic got thicker and slower.  The final three miles of the journey took me about an hour.  However, I was warmly welcomed by Leiba Sabon the lady who had booked me, and the day began. 

It was great fun, an all boys private school and a group of about 45 pupils, nearly all of whom were ready to laugh and join in.  It was a delightful day all round and helped me forget about my appalling drive in.  The snow seemed to continue falling most of the day and I began worrying about my journey home, but come the time to leave I was delighted to find most of the snow had melted away.  It was a great day at the school, but I can't add the jousting result to our overall score as it is a single sex school - shame really as the boys need all the points they can get!  My drive home was much quicker and less painful than the drive up.

I had dinner with my lovely Shelley that evening, before hitting the road again and heading down to Southampton and a room I had booked at a Travelodge in the town.  I found the hotel quite easily, I had stayed there once before, many years ago when I worked for Skandia - it was the last time we had the fuel strikes when everyone ballistic because petrol went over £1 per litre - £1?  Ah, the good old days...  I couldn't get fuel to get to work at Skandia and so for two nights I booked into the Travelodge until it all blew over.  I went into reception dragging my very heavy suitcase with me (it's because I had two weeks worth of clothes with me - yes, I was still away in a trip that began in the last blog entry).  I booked in, was handed a key for a room on the 4th floor, and was then told the lift was out of service.  Out of service?  Why?  Apparently it had been trashed by disgruntled Manchester City fans the previous weekend after we got thrashed by Southampton.  I promptly decided not to mention that I was a City fan.  The trogs in Southampton seem a bit touchy about the whole "Man City are rich these days" thing, if most of the idiotic comments I regularly have to read on Facebook are anything to go by.

My drive to the school was only about two miles the following morning.  The school was called St Mary's and was right next door to the big gleaming brand spanking new stadium of the same name that Southampton play in.  For such a big school it was a small group - just 20 children, something which usually makes the day quite difficult with a lack of atmosphere.  But this was a lively small group and they all seemed to enjoy themselves.  The whole day went swimmingly and culminated in a very enthusiastic joust, but unfortunately, although a Gents team won, they cheated so horrendously on the final leg that I had no option other than to disqualify them - so that leads to yet another win for the Ladies.  Our score inevitably goes on to:

GENTLEMEN 11 - 18 LADIES

Some very kind lads helped me load my stuff back into the car at the end of the day, and then I was on my way - but not before I almost drove off without packing my big case of props in the boot first - oops.  It was also nice to see Jen Frost, formerly of Skandia Life, now working at the school as the main receptionist.  I chatted with her about my recent visits to Skandia to see old friends.  I mentioned how on my last visit it was the middle of "Mo-Vember" and I was horrified to see NAME REMOVED ON LEGAL ADVICE with a big droopy moustache.  Jen said seeing NAME REMOVED ON LEGAL ADVICE at any time was bad enough.  I said NAME REMOVED ON LEGAL ADVICE with a moustache gave an even bigger impression of being like Blakey from "On the Buses".  "I hate you, Butler/Charlie!"  Make your own mind up former Skandia colleagues.

I drove back to Somerset and finally got home after 10 days away.  My throat was hurting, my head was pounding and I couldn't stop coughing.  I was coming down with a stinking cold.  What I needed was a long day in bed taking it easy.  Was I going to get it?  No.  I was back up at the crack of dawn for a long drive up to Hereford and a return visit to the lovely Riverside School there.  Now from Crewkerne to Hereford is normally about 2 hours at most by road, but being a tight fisted penny pinching type I decided not to follow the sat navs directions over the ludicrously expensive Severn Bridge toll and press on up to the M50 and cut across country.  OK, it put about 20 minutes on my journey, but it would be worth it, wouldn't it?  WRONG!  The M50 was virtually one solid set of roadworks from start to finish and I got stuck behind a doddery old fart in an elderly Honda Civic who obviously regarded driving faster than 40MPH anywhere was likely to lead to a complete breakdown of the human nervous system.  By the time I reached the A49 up into Hereford itself the morning rush hour was in full flow and I was going to be late.  I finally arrived at the school just before 9am.  But it was worth it, we had a fantastic day.  I suffered a lot with my coughing and dry throat, but we got through it and everyone seemed to have a really good time.  And guess what?  The ladies won the jousting AGAIN.  Can you believe this?  The score goes to:

GENTLEMEN 11 - 19 LADIES

Amazing stuff.  I followed the instructions of the sat nav to the letter on the way home and was back in my flat in about 2 hours as expected.  I will never argue with it again.  I have now had a lovely day off, a lay in this morning and then a short trip into town, where it was lovely to feel sunshine on my face - and, most amazing of all, warmth.  Could this herald the start of spring?  God I hope so.  I am so sick and fed up with snow.  In the words of Harry Enfield, "OI! SNOW!  NO!!!!"  Friday night I am off down to deepest darkest Devon for an appearance at Saunton Golf Club for a Rotary Club Dinner.  Then it is half term - time for some real quality time with my lovely son, James.  I can't wait!

Big Blog No Looky

Good King Hal asking King Charles II of Spain in drag, to spare him a couple of hundred groats for a cup of Reformation.... TEA!  He meant tea.

Honestly, loyal folks out there, the spirit is willing, but the flesh is failing fast.  I am slowly losing the will to write this blog to be honest.  The worst thing I could do was to publish it on Facebook, as now they send you a weekly update as to how your page and posts are doing.  The caption competition?  Regularly garners somewhere in the region of 200-300 hits.  My little one line updates?  Anything from about 80 up to 200.  My blog entries?  Er.... well, not as many.  In fact a recent one which I had written and taken a long time over getting it right managed to only get 19 hits.  Now that is not the sort of results you are looking for after pouring your guts out on the page.  So despite doing three shows this week I have struggled to find the enthusiasm for writing the damn thing up.  Perhaps I should just make it all up, and see if anyone notices.  OK, lets do that for a bit.

Ahem, OK, so I was at the "Skyfall" premiere the other night in my full Tudor gear.  I had been asked to go along by Cubby Brocolli's ghost and a small bowl of petunias.  I was accompanied to the soiree by Cardinal Richeleu, Max Jaffa, The Dagenham Girl Pipers and Dog the Bounty Hunter.  We arrived in a stretch limo made out of two off cuts of a Bond Bug and a US Military Hummer.  I waved at the crowd and shouted "God kväll mina underbara brittiska vänner! Denna Bygel-BH dödar mig, men tack och lov kan jag skaffa mig en Pimms och saft kort. Toodle pip!"  It's amazing where a bit of fluent Swedish can get you - Ulrika Jonsson's house for a start.  Just ask Sven.  Anyway, I tripped up the red carpet, but didn't spill a drop.  Sir Alex Ferguson came to greet me with a big smile on his ravaged red face.  I felled him with a swinging left hook.  As he struggled back to his feet I once more pole-axed the puce faced thistle arsed Scottish whinge bag with two short upper cuts and a lethal rabbit punch.  The crowd cheered tossing marmite vol-au-vonts in the air.  Just at that moment I felt a weak pathetic tap on my shoulder.  It was Daniel Craig in an I-Zingari romper suit with matching bonnet.  He mumbled something in that weak girly voice of his.  "WHAT?" I roared back at him, in my finest Brian Blessed.  So startled was he that he didn't need Movicol that night.  He finally managed to mumble something about leaving his wife alone.  I reached past him and grabbed Rachel Weisz, pulled her to me for a vacuum like snog and then said "Don't let's cheapen this, it was fun while it lasted, but you'll get over me..."  She fell to her knees, begging me to have her back, but it was too late.  I was already halfway up the Shard skyscraper with Fay Wray in my hands, and trying to stop bi-planes shooting me up the arse.  But then, all of a sudden, I couldn't have been more surprised when who should open a window on the 126th floor but... (continued on page 96).

There, that should confuse some of my foreign fans on Facebook.  Or perhaps I should have shouted in Czech?  A teď něco úplně jiného. Zde je Good King Hal obvykle blog.  See?  I told you.

Well for those who really do read this far, this is how the week has gone.  Sunday saw me driving back to the Isle of Wight, one year on from that awful journey (please see former entry about that!).  This time around my voyage to deepest darkest Ventnor was most pleasant, and apart from missing the 3.45pm boat I was booked on at Lymington, hassle free.  On the boat however, the personal choice Fascists have got to work.  No longer can you just kip in your car for the 20 minute crossing - oh no.  No, you are not allowed to enjoy that little pleasure.  You are forced, virtually at gun point up to the passenger lounge where you are assailed by piped music, advertising video screens and over priced coffee and sandwiches.  And if you complain you get keel hauled, which in the Solent is not much fun.  I arrived at Hannah Larkin's place (the teacher who books me at St Francis' School in Ventnor) just after 6pm and we went straight out, with a friend of hers to a nice pub called The Dairyman's Daughter at Arreton. 

The following day at the school was fun, hard work,  but ultimately very rewarding.  The jousting session in the afternoon was deafening and culminated in another win for the gents.  They have been doing a lot better of late and have managed to claw the score back to:

GENTLEMEN 5 - 5 LADIES

I left Ventnor and drove across the island in beautfiul early winter sunshine, taking in the magnificent views from the old Military Road down to Freshwater Bay.  Lovely. I managed to get an earlier ferry than expected and was soon being forced at gun point back up to the passenger lounge.  I drove back through Christchurch (for my sins) and eventually found myself at home munching through a very welcome Chinese meal.

I spent Tuesday visiting my old friend Pete Flanagan over at Tatworth where he lives, and it is nice to see him back on his feet again after such an awful injury he suffered in a road accident just over a year ago.  Again for details, search this blog.  On the Wednesday I was up bright and early for a trip back down to Knightwood School in Chandler's Ford near Southampton.  I was warmly welcomed as ever by Lee, the caretaker, who made me a bucket of tea and then told me his latest health problems, which was a bit of an eye opener.  Knightwood is such a brilliant school and we had a great day in their brilliantly architectured hall.  Even a disappointing lunch wasn't too bad - the dinner staff hadn't been told I was coming so hadn't cooked enough, but they let me have some home made pizza.  Now normally cheese at a primary school is as mild as Rowan Williams, but today the cheese on the pizza was more like being shouted at by Rev Ian Paisley.  It was CHEEEEEEEEESE, with a capital ouch.  But it filled a hole!  Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves on the Tudor Day and once more the joust went down a storm and we finished with another victory for the ladies team.  They now poke their noses back in front again, just holding off the gents.  Our score moves on to:

GENTLEMEN 5 - 6 LADIES

It was surprisingly cold down in Chandler's Ford that day and I was grateful for my big coat and heating in the car.  The drive home back through Salisbury was just like my old days going back from Skandia Life in Southampton.  I also might be startling some other old Skandia chums as the local rag for Southampton came along and did a load of photos of me for publication.  It will interesting to see if anyone in that neck of the woods notices.

Thursday was another show day, but a lot closer to home this time.  I was off back to the lovely Parkfield School in Taunton and another meet up with the legendary Head Teacher there, the deliciously named Mr Wynford Sides.  Parkfield is a delight, and it didn't disappoint one jot this time round.  Great fun day, lovely to see all my old friends there, including Christine - Bonjour, mon petit ami français!   A group of 60+ children, all very enthusiastic and all dressed in great costumes was the recipe for a perfect Henry VIII day. Even lunch was great - each year the staff at Parkfield insist on nipping out and buying me lunch, which makes me feel very grateful, but embarrassed.  So this year, on the way in I had stopped at a Spar store in Ilminster and had grabbed some sarnies and a drink.  I told EVERYONE at the school I had done this - everyone that was, except one.  And she trudged off to the local Tescos and returned with a lunch for me, only to discover me chewing my way through my own sandwiches when she returned to the school.  Bless her, she let me keep the lunch she'd bought, so I had it as a light dinner in the evening when I got home.  The final joust was another nail biter and finished with another victory for the ladies.  So our week finishes with the score at:

GENTLEMEN 5 - 7 LADIES

I drove home, ate my second lunch and then went out for a drink with Matthew Applegate at the Rose and Crown at East Lambrook.  Luckily the landlady wasn't there, so we had a lovely evening.

(cont from page 96)....with thick bleach and an oven glove.  But it wasn't enough.  Sure enough rivulets of molten magma began seeping under the door of the crofters cottage.  I turned quickly to see if anyone had any bright ideas.  Bryan Ferry was simply rocking back and forth on a stool in the corner saying "go to a happy place go to a happy place" over and over.  Douglas Bader was worried he'd be burnt to the ground (ba-doom-tish!) and Lily Cole STILL hadn't replied to my message on Facebook.  Call yourself a cousin???  With a final surge of energy and adrenaline, I leapt out of the window in a shower of glass and landed on the former speaker of the House of Commons, Bernard Weatherall.  I said "I thought you were dead."  He said "You can talk, dressed as Henry VIII".  I cuffed him playfully round the ear with my speaking trumpet and was soon on my Honda Fireblade roaring through the countryside on my way for a date with destiny.  But would you believe it, but who should come round the corner on a traction engine, with the Somerset T20 squad, Schnorbitz the dog and Dorothy Squires, but none other than old....(cont. next week).

Half Term Happiness

It was at approximately 11.45am that Good King Hal whipped out his big wooden trencher out and startled everyone.

Half term! Hoorah! What does half term normally entail for your average King Henry VIII impersonator? Well, to be honest, not a lot. With the schools all closed it usually involves lie ins and late nights, but this year the February half term was a bit different. For a start I had my lovely son James staying with me down in Somerset. Secondly I had a show to do at the Dementia Care Trust Home in Weston super Mare where I had appeared about four years ago.

It was funny - I had asked James what he was most looking forward to on his return to his county of birth, thinking he'd come back with something about "being with you, Daddy" or "a visit to Lyme Regis" or some such. Did I get that? Did I heck. What was he most looking forward to? Lunch at Bilby's Cafe in Ilminster. Well at least he has good taste in local food outlets. He and I drove down to Somerset on the Saturday, along with my sister Cathy who we picked up from her home in Kent as she wanted dropping off in Southampton to collect a new car she had bought from the Ebay website. She treated us, if that is the right word, to lunch on the way, which ended up being taken at the Rounham's service station on the M27. The food was, at best school dinner level and served by the sort of people you would imagine that if you asked them to follow your finger in front of their eyes, they'd be about two seconds behind. We found the home where the car was to be collected and waited with Cathy till she'd paid and then led her to the nearest petrol station that sold LPG for her new vehicle. Turned out it didn't sell LPG, but never mind, the thought was there. So as Cathy and her new Jeep Grand Cherokee headed east back to Kent, James and I continued west towards Somerset.

We had a nice lazy Sunday not doing very much other than watching Spongebob Squarepants endlessly on Nick Toons. On the Monday I fulfilled my promise to James and took him to Bilby's in Ilminster for lunch. Unfortunately, James' new medication for his concentration can also wreck his appetite, which it did on Monday. So while I sat and munched my way through ham, egg and chips (very healthy), James simply sat happily slurping from a bottle of diet coke.

Tuesday saw us up and early off for the show at the Dementia Care Trust in Weston super Mare. They are a lovely group and I am always made most welcome there - particularly from my dear old friend Diane Warren and her daughter Alice. James worked hard as my roadie helping me get my gear into the unit and waiting with me as I got changed. The talk went really well, and James sat happily with Diane throughout the show and even laughed quite loudly at a couple of my jokes. When the show was over James came up to me and said "you told some jokes!" as though it was illegal. I told him that I always try and make my shows funny, which he thought was marvellous.

Wednesday and I fulfilled another promise to James - to take him to see Star Wars - The Phantom Menace in 3D. We got into Yeovil quite early and I purchased the tickets for the 2.20pm showing. Next it was time for lunch and James wanted to go to Pizza Hut. Not a chance - a queue of Biblical proportions snaked out of the front door and down the road. OK, I was not heartbroken by this news, so we tried to get into Frankie and Bennie's, with pretty much the same result. Fair enough. About 20 yards up the road is a small Italian restaurant called La Tamboura or something - we walked down there, and it was virtually empty! We had a superb meal of real Italian food with a very hard working friendly staff who could not have been more attentive if they tried. After that blow out we wandered back to the cinema. OH MY GOD. It appeared that there had been an explosion in a "spotty-bed-haired-annoying-teenager-factory" somewhere and they had all landed in the cinema foyer. The queue for the ticket booth snaked right across the entrance hall and the queue for the popcorn was only marginally shorter. As we already had tickets we joined the popcorn queue. The huge amounts of spotty adolescents in the line was matched only by the spotty adolescents behind the counters who seemed to be content on finding anything to do other than serve the ever swelling crowd in front of them. Time was whizzing past and the queue was barely moving. With only about 5 minutes before the film was due to start, we finally got served. A small bag of popcorn and slush puppy for James, a small diet coke (small? It was about the size of your average garden water butt) and a packet of wine gums for me and it cost over £12. How on Earth can they justify these prices? Anyway, we belted into the screen where Star Wars was showing, expecting it to be chock full of the annoying adolescents to find the room almost completely empty - they'd all obviously come to see Daniel Radcliffe in "The Woman in Black", and I was insanely jealous. The Phantom Menace, not to put too fine a point on it, is a truly appalling film. Terrible script, abject plotting, half formed characters, stilted dialogue and of course Jah-Jah f*****g Binks. I put my 3D glasses on and promptly fell asleep until James elbowed me for snoring too loudly. The film seemed to go on forever, but James loved it, so that is all that matters.

So today, Thursday I am driving the little fellow back to Essex. I will thoroughly enjoy having my bed back to myself, but by God the flat (and my life) is going to feel very empty without him around. He is so gorgeous and my pride and joy. I can't spend enough time with him!

U3A & Southampton...

Following my appearance at St Bartholomew's Church Fete back at the end of the summer, I had been approached by several members of the local U3A group to do a talk for them at one of their monthly meetings. This occurred last Monday at the Methodist Church in South Street, Crewkerne. They advertised the show as "The Mystery from History", which was a pretty snappy title. The hall was cold, but pretty full, and I was asked to wear a throat mic for some of the more "mutton" members of the group. I started a little shakily, after all this was my first Henry talk for nearly a month, but I was soon in my stride and I have to say I got a really good response from the group. Lots of laughter, particularly at some of the stories I told about children saying things to me.

Today, Wednesday, I have been back to sunny Southampton to visit some old friends I used to work with at Skandia Life. Before Iwent to the restaurant to meet the main group, I went to Skandia House itself and saw, among others the lovely Sue Plumb, Trevor the bizarre security man, Janet Mabey, Miles Butler (he still hasn't gone metric), Vanessa Adamson, Tracie Callaway (as was) from CCS and the sainted Paul Stewart. Paul looks after a lot of the software and servers at Skandia and apparently gets an alert every time Skandia Life is mentioned somewhere. So... SKANDIA LIFE SKANDIA LIFE SKANDIA LIFE! That should blow a few fuses.

I then wandered round to Piccolo Mondo, a brilliant but tiny restaurant near Skandia House that we always used to use and met up with Ruth Le Mesurier and Sue Marsh. We three nearly always used to meet up on a Wednesday and put the world to right, but now in 2009 we find that only Sue is still working for Skandia. Ruth has more or less retired and I am making a crust leaping around like a gert big Tudor Jessie. We had a lovely meal and a good laugh and joke about life in general, but all too soon it was time for me to be on my way. Sue and Ruth both say when they Google their names, they only ever come up on this blog. Well, glad to have given them a couple more hits!