Michael Wojas' Burning Up

Colony Room landlord Michael Wojas’s funeral service – or “burning up” as he would have called it – was a deeply moving event that mirrored his irreverent, kindly and quirky approach to life.

It seemed for me strange returning to Kensal Green Crematorium, in north-west London. I had not been there since Freddie Mercury’s burning up in 1992. On that grim day, there were only around 20 family, band and friends inside the chapel, and around 150 journalists, me included, outside.

For Michael, there were 300 mourners crowded into the chapel, many sitting on the floor at the front or standing at the back.

Possibly the greatest gathering of Colony Room Club folk ever, you could see them blinking in the bright sunshine before the service or getting tanked up at the pub down the road.

There was definitely a bohemian tenor to the crowd. The chap next to me, for instance, was displaying in his jacket pocket a quick caricature of Michael he had sketched on the way to the crematorium with the word “cu*t” written above it.

Michael had come in a cardboard coffin, in the glass-covered sidecar of a combination motorcycle.

I found the service deeply moving. Michael’s girlfriend, Amanda Harris, read a Dr Seuss book which, remarkably closely, recounted the adventure on which Michael had embarked in his life.

Friend Sally Dunbar summed up his kindliness and quirky humour in her glowing tribute, and poet John Moore caught the free-wheeling nature of the Colony Room in a poem he read.

The tears came, however, when Michael's brother spoke, reading out a letter from his heartbroken mother who had recently also lost her daughter to cancer. She used the Polish version of Michael's name in the letter.

For the first time I thought of Michael’s early life, his family and the conventional lifestyle he had rejected.

It was intriguing to hear Michael Wojas had attained a 2.1 in chemistry at Nottingham University. Having endured two years of a chemistry degree just a few years later at Hull University, I could picture Michael in a stained white lab coat, slaving over a complex synthesis in organic chemistry practicals on old Victorian acid-scarred thick wooden worktops, Bunsen Burners flaring, amidst acrid and noxious odours from dangerous hydrocarbons. It did not seem him at all.

Far easier to imagine the next stage of his life: travelling round Europe, picking fruit in the Mediterranean sun, working in French bars, before drifting to Soho and landing a part-time casual job at the Colony Room Club, then run by Ian Board.

I never met Ian Board or his predecessor Muriel Belcher, but as a member of the Colony Room Club for the last dozen years of its life, I always felt I was drinking with their ghosts.

The club was partly a shrine to their memory, and to their association with each other and Michael Wojas, the chosen successor.

Indeed, the legend of the verbal abuse you could expect at the Colony Room lived on.

However, I can only ever remember politeness and good company from Michael.

If he swore, it was certainly not directed at me or other members. And the only time I can recall him losing his temper was when the Catholic Church was mentioned.

A Humanist led the service at Kensal Green. Humanists, I observed at another friend’s (Mike Knapp's) funeral a few years earlier, are adept at summing up the legacy of those who do not believe in the after-life.

The Alabama 3 conjured up a special atmosphere in the chapel. As well as the tears there were a lot of smiles and laughter, especially when it came to the ‘burning up’ with the cardboard box not fitting through the hatch to the furnace.

It gave mourners the chance to lay their hands on the coffin after the service, before they bustled off onto a green vintage double-decker bus or, in my case, the Tube to wend their way to the wake, on the first floor of the Groucho Club, Dean Street, Soho – next door to the now-defunct Colony Room.

The wake passed in a bit of daze, not that I drank much. One minute the room was empty, then for hours you could hardly breathe.

At around 4pm many of us traipsed downstairs and outside, stopping the traffic on Dean Street to let go of scores of green helium balloons with handwritten tributes to Michael on their tags.

Standing with my old friend Clancy Gebler Davis in the shadow of the Colony Room, I wished I could go back up the rickety stairs to see it again one last time. Much of its ancient apparel is still there, I heard someone say, but it was locked up of course and no one present had a key.

It was great to see those green balloons rise above Soho into the flawless blue sky.

Back inside the old Grouch, the live music kicked off.

I never attended music nights at the Colony Room.

For me the club was about quiet afternoons and early evenings. I would drop by and talk with Michael or join a round of old soaks at the bar.

I guess because of that I did not know many of the other members, something that struck home to me at the funeral and the wake.

The music at the wake was great.

A very tall bloke with a bowler hat and mirror shades compered, introducing a soulful singer who performed an excellent number.

An very upset woman read a poem that I found puzzling and disturbing in equal measure.

Later, a guy played the spoons like there was no tomorrow, and two guitarists strummed their instruments behind their backs. (You can tell that I am out of practice with this music criticism malarky!)

Lisa Stansfield started her short set with the memorable words: “Shuddup or f*ck off!”, referring to the Groucho hubbub that refused to quiet for the musicians.

I loved her rendition of My Funny Valentine – and told her afterwards, though I could not catch what she said in reply. I have always liked Lisa, a typically down-to-earth member of the Colony Room.

Her duet with another singer - who name I don’t know (sorry!) - was also superb.

The most moving turn, though, was a girl who half-sang, half-spoke about what Michael Wojas had done for her with a chorus line something like: “That’s why you f*cking mean so much to me.”


It also struck the nail on the head. People loved Michael because he listened to them and was kind.

There he was in the corner seat smoking and drinking himself to death, soaking up the woes of his clientele, prescribing more booze. A self-help group for alcoholics, as someone said at the funeral.

As the evening wore on, I realised that it was not only his friends' wake for Michael Wojas but for the Colony Room they had lost in late 2008 (or, in reality, some time before that).

As the music played out with a rousing set by the Alabama 3, many were dancing and grinning. One girl amidst them was weeping uncontrollably on another’s shoulder.

I was shocked by some of things written in the press about Michael Wojas.

Social writers seemed to find it impossible to distinguish him from Ian Board or Muriel Belcher, as if they were just three incarnations of a Colony Room Dr Who.

I am fortunate to have nothing but happy memories of Michael Wojas and the unique club that gradually died with him.

This is my tribute:

Michael Wojas’ Burning Up

Michael arrived wearing cardboard
On a motorbicycle made for two,
He took his place at the bar
And smiled at his motley crew.

Sally wore a top hat,
Clancy was a beacon of green,
Amanda spoke of 'strange birds',
Michael watched it all, content, serene.

The sound system went on the blink,
The Alabama 3 struck up a tune,
Michael sang along within his box,
It was quite like The Colony Room.

The Burning Up went awry:
Michael's final earthly joke,
The cardboard did not fit the hatch,
Michael wasn't ready for his last smoke.

When A A Gill Met Joe's Comedy Madhouse

I made it through the festive season and enjoyed it, despite the occasional bizarre hiccup along the road (would you believe that the rector at Southover Church Lewes produced and proffered his dirty socks, which had been festering for three months, as an illustration of his perplexing sermon on Christmas morning!)

Also, I must mention an extraordinary missive from my dear friend DJ E, who emailed to say he had been reading a book by A A Gill in which the Sunday Times TV and restaurants critic mentioned my former comedy club, Joe's Comedy Madhouse.



As followers of this journal may know, I promoted Joe's Comedy Madhouse in a variety of venues from June 1997 until November 2005, when I decided to close it on a rousing high with headliner Phil Nichol (pictured) performing his Edinburgh Fringe Award winning show, supported by the best of the other acts from the Madhouse years. An unforgettable and unbelievable night in a totally packed venue!

During those eight-and-a-half years, Joe's Comedy Madhouse gave stage time to up-and-coming comedians including Jimmy Carr, Daniel Kitson (another Perrier Award winner), Shappi Khorsandi (Best Newcomer at Edinburgh), Stephen Merchant (Ricky Gervais's co-writer and co-star in The Office and Extras) and Marek Larwood (Best Edinburgh Newcomer) among many others.



Most important of all, I gave stage time to anyone and everyone who wanted it - regardless of how good or bad they were at comedy, but with a particular onus on the genuinely crazy acts (the Comedy Terrorist, for instance, started at my club).

I attended all but one of the Madhouse shows - I was away working in the Holy Land and a huge argument broke out that night leading to the club's eviction from its then venue - and almost always was at the door and then introduced the gig (for years, I did it after a taped introduction which I had made using interviews I had done with Jerry Springer and Gordon Brown).



Strangely, I do not recall Adrian Gill having attended the club, even though I had appeared with him on a late-night chat show on BBC Radio 5 Live on several occasions and, so, one might have thought we should have recognised each other.

I was filled with doubt that DJ E had got it right (central London is flush with madcap comedy clubs of a Wednesday night), but curiosity got the better of me.

So, on New Year's Eve, I went to W H Smith in Lewes to enquire after the alleged A A Gill book, succinctly and deftly entitled The Angry Isle Hunting The English.



In among the B- and C-listers, there was no sign of it. It was all Clarkson, Ramsay, Jamie, Jordan, Morgan, Nigella and various other fine, famous people.

I collared the shop girl who asked me to repeat the name before typing it into her stock computer.

'We had two some time ago, but they've not here no more,' she said with an expression that suggested they'd gone back to the wholesaler.

It was the same story in Lewes's other new book store where a crusty old gent described the work as a 'classic', somewhat sarcastically I suspected.

I walked to Lewes Library thinking, 'Just how dodgy is this book by A A Gill?'

At the library, the assistant immediately said it would be the shelf. I asked her to show me but there no sign of the elusive volume.

'It must be lost,' she said, as if this were the natural fate for it.

'No, there it is,' I said, pointing it out, really rather delighted to have found it at last.



Then, strangely, I felt the need to get out a slim volume of poetry by the Poet Laureate Andrew Motion, as if I were an embarrassed teenager purchasing aspirins along with condoms.

Still, I could hardly wait to see what Adrian had made of Joe's Comedy Madhouse.

It did not take long to find.

The book fell open at the Humour chapter and even a cursory skip quickly revealed that Adrian's research had only extended to going to one comedy night in Soho, London, that had been cancelled and a second, down the road, which was mine.

I was intrigued by his gradual build-up to his inevitable demolition job on Joe's Comedy Madhouse.

Adrian seemed to hate Soho, hate the people he found there, hate the Intrepid Fox pub (scene of the cancellation), hate the Goth night which was taking place there instead, hate the nearby Crown pub, hate its Sky TV screens, hate its customers, hate its toilets, hate their smell, hate the room upstairs in which where Joe's Comedy Madhouse was being staged!

Reading it was like watching a juggernaut approaching a hedgehog at an ineffable laconic rate!

I recall the gig he described in his book but, surprisingly, do not remember A A Gill being there.

Surprisingly because I had appeared on BBC Radio Five Live with A A Gill for at least a couple of two-hour shows, and, yet, in the small and almost empty room I did not recognise him. . . and he did not recognise me.

On the contrary, he describes me in his account as a 'bearded young man', even though I was aged 43 at the time and clean shaven.



Still, I am vain enough to be flattered by this description. A A Gill will be 55 this year (if his own evidence is to be believed), so, maybe, I simply looked young to him.

The deliberately shambolic set-up of the Madhouse was not lost on him.

He wrote of the 'unmatched mix of pub chairs' (I'd always prided myself on making them look messy) and the lopsided and battered backdrop which he wrote 'looked like a prop from a junior school end-of-term play'.

Said item was made in 1997 from material purchased at Dalston Fruit 'n' Veg Market, and, when I read this to them, they were all in tears of laughter that it should be featured in a hardback book published by Orion and retailing for a penny short of 19 quid!

I was rather pleased by the next bit, that I had extracted six quid from A A Gill for coming in - if he had introduced himself I would have waived the entrance fee.

Still, no doubt it was tax deductible for him.

Adrian made the point that Joe is not my real name. Absolutely true, but then neither are Ollie or Oliver. (Best not to go there).

He said that Madhouse is "an unpromising moniker for 'cutting edge experimental comedy'. Here, Adrian has a point, although, to be embarrassingly frank, I picked Madhouse as a name for another reason - I had been a fan of Russ Abbot's Madhouse (a classic Saturday teatime comedy TV show that Adrian would doubtless have hated for its sense of puerile fun).

Then, in his book, Adrian moved onto the compere.



My resident MC and latterly co-promoter was a gentleman by the name of Phil Zimmerman (pictured), who now promotes and performs at a highly successful comedy club in Drayton, west London.

I would most certainly have introduced him as Phil Zimmerman, yet A A Gill reports my words (in the guise of 'introductory student beardy' - more age flattery) as: 'Welcome to Joe's Comedy Madhouse, and without more ado here's Sid Zimmerman - your host for the evening. A big hand please.'

Sounds plausible, apart from the 'Sid' bit. Where on earth did A A get that from?

Adrian goes on: 'Sid isn't his real name.' Well, that's true. To mine (and Zimmerman's) knowledge, he has never used the name Sid!

But Adrian adds: 'Zimmerman is.' (his name).

Untrue, unfortunately. Phil's real name is Craigie, under which, ironically, he was for many years a journalist colleague of A A Gill at The Sunday Times newspaper. Still, no matter. Why let facts get in the way of a good rant.

Adrian continues: 'It used to be Bob Dylan's name too. Maybe it was Sid's branch of the family that made Bob consider changing it to that of a drunk Welsh Soho doggerelist.'



It is nice Adrian has got the Dylan connection. Phil did indeed change his surname because of an enthusiasm for the great Bob Dylan.

However, I have to say that Adrian's snipe at the great poet Dylan Thomas is a little on the cheap side, in my humble opinion.

These inaccuracies are contained in just the first two paragraphs of two pages on Joe's Comedy Madhouse. And there a couple of hundred of pages to the book.

Goodness knows how many factual errors the entire work contains.

I have to confess I quite enjoyed Adrian's subsequent description of Phil's performance, although it was a little cruel and missing the somewhat obvious point that he is a character act, The Pigeonman.

He is not playing himself. Maybe, A A Gill really believes Al Murray really runs a pub or Dame Edna Everage is a woman. Anything's possible.



I also enjoyed his description of the subsequent acts.

I admit that I never felt I had done my job properly in booking the line-up if at least a couple of first-half acts didn't make the audience squirm with embarrassment.

It was always part of my enjoyment to make them suffer for a decent headliner later in the night.

The chapter gets a bit boring after that. After half an hour, Adrian is off and out of the pub, pondering why anyone would want to do stand-up.

There's another mention of me being young, but he concludes the experience of performing comedy at my club must be like 'dressing up as a traffic warden because you to meet people and make friends'.

This last remark was uncannily apposite. One of my Madhouse acts, Ivan Steward, often used to dress up as a traffic warden at the club and did indeed meet people and make friends as a result.

I tried to plough through the rest of the chapter and the book, but found it a highly irksome read. A style that works well for an 800-word TV critique in the Sunday Times Culture section does not in my view cut it over 80,000 words in book form.

Adrian seems to be working on the basic premise that the English character is based on anger, but he fails to substantiate the argument- Anyway, it is hard to see why he has singled out the English.



My own experience of being English, but originally of Scottish stock, is that there is not a huge gulf between the English and the Scots.

If anything, the Scots are more prone to anger than the English who (like English-sounding Scot A A Gill) prefer a good moan.

In the final analysis, however, I would say the English, the Welsh and the Scots are all gifted at having a whinge and losing their rags.

The chapter on booze was more interesting (and accurate) than much of the book. This is, at least, an area where Adrian has some real research.



He starts by saying he is an alcoholic. But like so many dried-out soaks, he is quite harsh on those who continue to drink.

What surprised me most about the book was Adrian's assertion that he was in some way part of the entertainment industry.

Honestly it had never occurred to me that A A Gill might see his work as somehow comedic in its tenor.

Yet, thinking about it, I remembered the Adrian Gill I had met in the BBC Radio 5 Live studio those year ago, a man with a monocle who said he would not review Coronation Street because of all the working class Northerners in it.



And I thought of the only A A Gill fan I had ever met, a working class Northerner (a heavy-drinking Scouser sub-editor on the Daily Star) and it seemed to me that, yes, A A Gill's role is in some small way to add the gaity of the nation, just as Boris Johnson's is.

I am not entirely convinced Adrian was even at Joe's Comedy Madhouse.

The glaring inaccuracies in his account of events (such as my alleged beard) and the fact I did not recognise him makes me think a stodge with a dodgy Biro might have been representing the great personage on that auspicious night.

But God bless A A Gill!



It had always been a dream of mine that Joe's Comedy Madhouse would be immortalised in some way - and, like a Jimmy Savile for 21st Century, Adrian has fixed it for me. Thanks, old son. You have made my day.

I shall tap up my mates at the Sunday Times for his home address and write to Adrian to thank him - and invite him as my guest to my new club, Eight Pints of Poetry, which is to launch at the Lewes Arms, Lewes, East Sussex, on the night of Friday, 15 February 2008.



The headliner is the fantastic stand-up poet Ash Dickinson who genuinely is a young man with a beard!

If he still has a sense of humour, he can even perform a poem there.

January is an especially grim month. Partly because of the weather. Partly because I don't drink. Partly because reality bites like a crocodile.

It is very hard to forget the tough realities of life in the Garret/s when you are freezing and stone-cold sober.

Still, my diet is going well. I have lost around half a stone (seven pounds) so far without even doing any serious exercise.

This year I have not made any resolutions. The reason is that I never manage to keep them, and not for want of trying.

As I get older, the forces of chaos and society seem to conspire to hold you back.

This year I am simply going to bear in mind various things I would like to do and hope I can make them happen. I have no firm resolutions to achieve anything.

I would like to catalogue my photographs, four decades of them dating from 1970.

Otherwise I will completely forget who and what is on these thousands of black and white or colour images.

Incidentally, I took a great number of photographs over Christmas and New Year. Some will appear with this blog entry if I get them back from the processor's lab soon enough (I have not gone digital and have no plan to become so).

I am also using some pictures left over on an unpublished blog page from last year (in the name of good housekeeping).

Cataloguing my pictures is going to be a huge task, but if I can start this year, that will be something.

I would like start to get together a collection of my poetry. This is another tough one. I am currently working on editing my 2007 poems. Never have I written so many incomplete pieces. There is a lot of writing involved in editing them!



Even finding them (and on manifold notebooks and scraps of paper and envelopes) and typing them out (some I could hardly read, I'd been in such an emotional state) was a hard and time-consuming process.

I would like to enter some poetry contests this year and submit poems to poetry magazines. I'd also like to learn more of them, to get away from the reading.

Most of all, I would like to write with more passion, honesty and courage.

I suppose I have made one resolution for 2008: I must get in touch with old friends.













I am terrible for falling out of touch with people. In 2007 losing two friends with whom I had fallen out of touch made me realise just how long the parting is after death.

So I want to see again a string of people I would love to see again all of whose full names are not given below, in no particular order:

John B: a sailing friend much older than me (I telephoned him and had a really good chat),

John McFarlane: a former school teacher and great influence on me in my youth. I have not heard from him since 1981. He was living in Yemen,

Linda D: A good friend from the Daily Star who I have not seen 2001. Last heard of in Dublin,

Christy C: A pal from the Sunday Telegraph with whom I fell out of touch when I left in 1997,

Monica Healion (now married and called Stone, I believe): An Irish friend now believed to be living the U.S. Have not heard from her since 1991 or so,

Tricia Stead: A mate from Hull University who lived near me in Broadstone, Poole, in Dorset. Not heard from her since about 1992,

Russell T: A school friend who I have not seen since the mid-1990s. Believed to be in South Korea. I already have a lead for contacting him,

Tim R: A Sunday Telegraph mate with whom I lost touch after 1997. Believed to be in Washington D.C. or touring the States covering the primaries,

Mike P: My madcap boss at the Daily Star. Never a close friend but I am curious about him. Believed to be in Los Angeles,

Tracey H: A friend with whom I worked on the Coventry Evening Telegraph. Have not seen since 1998 or so. Believed to be living in London,

Melanie K: Another friend from the Coventry Evening Telegraph. Have not seen since 1992 or so. Believed to be living in the Midlands,

Roger E: A friend from Coaster magazine in Bournemouth. Fell out with him in grand style over an article I wrote for the Sunday Telegraph (my fault),

Paul E: A school mate with whom I also fell out for reasons still a mystery to me. Unfinished business.



There's a baker's dozen. If and when appropriate, I shall keep you apprised of how I get on tracing them!

There are also others whose whereabouts I know but I have just fallen out of the habit of seeing.

This life of living in two Garrets in Leamington and Lewes has cost me heavily in my old friendships, and that saddens me.

It getting late now in the Leamington Garret. My flatmate Attila has gone to bed. It is cold and I am not feeling sleepy enough.

I listening to Tonight at the Arizona by The Felice Brothers, a superb CD and birthday present, which I am playing through Attila's computer and the old music centre. On the third track, Hey Hey Revolver, they are struck by lightning but keep playing!

On top of the music centre, I have lit a Vanilla and Apple scented candle. I told you I am in a strange mood.



Change is in the air but also great uncertainty. I felt very unsettled at work this week.

Moreover, poetry has gone out of the window. I have just not been able to focus on a poem for weeks.

Obviously I don't know what this year holds for me. And my lack of control scares the life out of me more this year than ever before.

I had just seen Charlie Wilson's War at the cinema. A great film. I always like watching films about my family.

It made me think how like Uncle Charlie I am. I share his love of life; if only I had his courage...

The Seedy Side of Royal Leamington Spa

For a change I thought I'd show you the real Royal Leamington Spa - the side of this quaint, Regency town in quaint old middle England that visitors don't know exists.

All the decay, tumbleweed and dereliction. The many bits of this tourist town that the council's vast income from tax, parking charges and other sources does not reach.

The flaking paint, crumbling buildings, faded glory.



My good mood continues unabated (I thoroughly enjoyed taking these pictures, although I am deliberately not publishing images of the countless mentalists, vagrants, druggies and alkies who comprise the denizens of the badlands of downtown Leamington).

I am getting into the Christmas spirit and trying to enjoy myself in moderation. Never easy for me!

The Festive Season is always wondrously fun but also hugely dangerous. This point was more than adequately illustrated at a Christmas party in a hotel near Leamington the other Friday when I got trolleyed and, for reasons unknown, started swinging from a thick, wooden beam high above the dance floor.



I was achieving tremendous height with my swings when the inevitable happened - I lost my grip and took off like an Exocet missile some eight foot above the dance floor. When I finally hit ground, it was onto my back with a sickening thud. By God, I felt that. Instant agony.

The people around thought I had broken my back and, indeed, it seemed absolutely miraculous that I got up. The next morning, I found myself wrapped in bruises: back, arms, ribs, wrist, you name it. I was a mess.

Later when I heard accounts of my trajectory and the enormous crack that my bonehouse took as it smashed into the none-too-pliable dance floor, it seemed incredible that I had not ended up in hospital (I like to put it down to the John Paul II rosary beads in my pocket bringing divine intercession, as occurred with him and the swerving bullet).



Why was I so totally out of my head? I had been all right at the same event on two previous years.

Well, I suppose my old mate Mike Knapp's funeral that day had upset me far more than I had expected or would have admitted.

Michael Geoffrey Knapp (10 May 1961 - 29 November 2007) - as writ on the service sheet - was cremated at South West Middlesex Crematorium. The chapel was packed with family, friends and old colleagues from Express Newspapers.

It was an emotional and memorable service, although I'd say not because of the 'humanist celebrant' who was, I felt, as dry as a bone. (Think, ticket collector).

Mike's old friend Dave Paul spoke very movingly, as did Mike's dad and brother. It was very hard not to be tearful.

Like me, Mike was a 1961 baby and, afterwards, at the wake overlooking The Thames at The Bell Inn in Hampton, I pondered how and why he had been taken so young.

When I first knew him in 1988, I would never have imagined he would have died before me.














I liked Do Not Stand at My Grave and Weep, the poem read at the funeral (although the humanist did not, in my view, do it justice):

In those quiet moments in the still of the night
Remember to rejoice and celebrate life
Do not think of me gone and weep
I am not there, I do not sleep
I am a thousand winds that blow
I am the diamond glints on snow
I am the sunlight on the grain
I am the gentle autumn's rain
When you awaken in the morning hush
I am the swift uplifting rush
of quiet birds in flight
I am the soft stars that shine
You will hear my gentle voice
and remember to rejoice
Never give up your fight
and remember always
to Celebrate Life....



Seemed so apposite. I guess Mike Knapp enjoyed his life and checked out with few regrets.




I have been finding it very hard to make the time to write this journal. In the week since Mike's funeral, life has been a little bit of a social whirl.

With my flatmate Attila, I went to a surprisingly entertaining (and hilarious) gathering of video game makers at the Royal Pump Rooms in Leamington. It was nice to him to get me in and the booze was only a quid a beer.



Also in Leamington, I led a seasonal booze-up of colleagues which turned out great, as more and more youngsters arrived to party. It ran from 5.30pm in the White Horse to past 3am in Kelseys. Wisely, I knocked off at around 1.15am in the Robbins Wells (and for once gave the Big K a miss).

A great craic, and I caught up with my photographer friend Jason Tilley (see Images of India) who dropped by for a chat and ended up crashing on my sofa.



On the Friday night, I met my dear friend Brian in London, which was looking particularly Christmassy and beautiful.

We met at the Coach and Horses in Soho (now rebranded as 'Norman's Coach and Horses' with four to five quid-a-piece sandwiches - what would Jeffrey Barnard have made of it?) Otherwise, it was mercifully similar to its former state.



That night it was the annual party at my club, the Colony Room, which was celebrating its 59th birthday, so we adjourned there.

It seemed even more wild than usual. One member had brought in his hound; another was staggering around, hopelessly drunk (like me in years past).



It was very great to see the gaffer, Michael, who is the life and soul of the Col. I am looking forward to next year's bash, the 60th. I remember the 50th and it was an amazing night.



Brian and I had a nightcap at The French House which is a timeless public house, virtually unchanged since it was home from home to the exiled French in the Second World War.

Knocking back numerous half-pints of Guinness (the French House does not sell pints), the atmosphere of that place was tangible.

I almost could picture the wartime French haunting their old haunt.













I did my last poetry gig of the year, at PureAndGoodAndRight, now in the vaults of the Robbins Well, Leamington.

As often happens with pre-Christmas gigs, there was a poor turn-out, so I took the opportunity to workshop a couple of new poems hot off the press (I'd written one on the train from Lewes to the gig).



They were very much work in progress but listening to the reaction of the small crowd was useful.

The atmosphere was good and the headliner, Ash Dickinson, was excellent. He certainly didn't let the dearth of punters put him off, enthusiastically performing two sets. Another great night!



Now I am gearing up for Christmas. I have two more days in Leamington Spa before heading south for the season.

I am still trying to plough through the New Oxford Book of English Verse, and have just read Andrew Marvell (1621 - 1678), a poet I know and particularly like. So it is definitely looking up.

And I am very pleased that my long article about the poetry scene plus my review of a CD of William Blake poems set to music has been published on the centre pages of The Stage, the ever-interesting actors' and performers' newspaper.



Somehow I don't feel ready for Christmas. This year is not quite complete.

Indeed I do not even like to reflect on the year because I have failed in so much of what I resolved to do in 2007.

Nevertheless, my spirits are high. Even though I still ache all over - nine whole days after my spectacular Christmas party crash!

It is 11.30pm and I am checking this blog before emailing you all about it and an update of Oliver's Poetry.

A crescent, almost UFO-esque moon is to my right. A bit of magic in the night. But bitterly cold on the street.