Thankfully we took the camera out with us this weekend. You wouldn't believe the time we have had if there wasn't proof.
I had thought October was the slow month over here, the Autumn winds blowing, temperatures falling and the leaves changing colour. I thought perhaps for this blog there would be some nice orangey yellowy pics of trees by babbling brooks in the Dales. I could talk about the crisp days and views, you know the usual "isn't it beautiful, wouldn't you love to be here with us to see it all", that sort of crud.
Well blow that.
We've been having too much fun.
LEEDS
I had heard of this Leeds Light night thing through the week and despite feeling a bit lazy we dragged ourselves off the couch and headed off into Leeds. I could try and put the night from then into some context but rather I'll let the snaps give a clue .
This first one is disadvantaged by the flash. It is a rat maze, hence the rat noses, and was dark, hence the torches, a space put together by the Leeds StoryHunters telling tales of rat kings and boys and legend of events in the Dark Arches which Leeds is built on over the River Aire. Most scary
To get our nerves together after that we went to the City Inn Skylounge ,which overlooks the city, for a wine and an accidental chat to some inebriated but friendly and happy Leeds executive types. Actually we were looking for a quiet space to decide which of the 107 Light events on that night we were going to see. Happily there was a performance event down on the first floor.
It was the White Rabbit Meeting Group. They were meeting every half hour discussing things like why there had been nothing done since last meeting etc. We joined the queue and decided to go to the next meeting.
The actual meeting was late to start, the chairman, see high chair at top of table, had wandered off somewhere. Steve was a bit concerned but being the professional ran the meeting . There was music and blocks and crayons and lots of discussion about the role of restaurants, hominids, I think, and some points were discussed but no one knew what they were.
Dahlia took the minutes which by and large were very artistic but made little sense, a clear representation of the meeting's events.
Leaving the meeting, during which Gail and I had decided what to do next, we headed back through the Dark Arches over the river Aire, sorry the River Styx, where we had to pay the ferry keeper or Orion or someone, with our future souls
This was a shame really as our next scheduled visit was to a city centre church where an angel had landed and was being used as a shadow sculpture for the night. Could have used some soul for that I guess.
Not far around the corner, in the middle of Briggate, that's the shopping main drag, we spotted a gypsy caravan selling tea coffee and cupcakes. And drying her smalls.
Had to buy a couple of cakes as they were gypsylicious but they did put sparkles all over our mouths and hands so we were quite festive faced for the rest of the night.
Which was perhaps just as well because we would otherwise have felt a bit plain talking to the bloke from Urban Harvest.
He and a tribe of his mates were wheeling a barrow full of hedgerow harvested apples, pears and heaps of stuff through the city crowds. The fruit was sweet and ripe and wonderful. Not that pretty, but as fresh as tomorrow. He and his mates are trying to get local towns and villages to utilise the natural food resources from the streets and as you know from our springtime blog entry Gail and I are now keen hedge-browsers for plumbs and berries so we had a good old chat and exchanged top sites for seasonal picking. God, we sound naff don't we? Anyway we were just killing time until the interpretive retail dance was scheduled.
There were a crew of about 8 dancers who pretended to be mannequins and dressers and shop clerks who took over HarveyNichols department store and did a performance which we followed through women's, men's and shoe departments.
With the best will in the world I couldn't get into this routine except for the very last bit where they did actually do something that was co-ordinated and looked like a bit of coreography. Leaving hurredly we strolled up an arcade that had been turned into a cardboard gramophone display. We strolled the line and Gail fell in love with one but being a good citizen left it there for others to enjoy. If we had have paid attention to the handbook for the night we could have seen they were all there to be taken home if you liked them..... sort of donated distributed art if you will.
Leeds is as you may know a University city. I just had to put in these girls who were part of some strange three-legged race through the city, there were about 50 of them , all as cute as, all in singlets and shorts and sox, many not that committed to the three legged idea but all out for a jolly good time.
All through Leeds there are wonderful sculptures in bronze, this one is Reclining Woman by Henry Moore, a Yorkshire lad. Anyway, it's getting cold so the good people of the Leeds crafts society decided it was time the less well clad sculptures got winter woolies knitted for them. So many of the bronze sculptures we saw that night sported some wrapping or other. There are others below but there were many more. I liked the Bikinis on all the female bronzes in city square.
In front of the Town Hall lots of things were happenning. These guys were taking part in a stand up stationary roller coaster ride. What you ask?
Well you see there is a box you stand on, the bloke turns on a huge fan to blow your hair, you pretend to scream, his mate takes a photo, tells you you are group number 126 and you go home and download the image off his web site. Despite what you might think it was a whole heap of fun and people were queueing and laughing for ages!
Idea came to him one night in a pub. He couldn't believe how popular it was. Expect to see one in a park near you soon.
While looking for something to eat I bumped into a bird who was taller than me.
But I didn't stay around her for long because we found a carpet party setting up. A what you ask? A couple of guys and gals carry a roll of carpet around, roll it out and set up a disc player, hand out party hats and invite people to have a party. We were in for that, so secured a corner bit of carpet.
Things started to get out of hand after the chocolate cake was bought out and cut up, with a paper plate folded over, health and safety prevented a knife on the street we were told. (Ha!) The crowd was building and all were quite keen to get a slice, Gail and I were hungry though so we secured a large handfull of scrumptious crumbs and icing. Had to eat it quick though because Rolf Harris was singing Tie Me Kangaroo down sport at volume through the MP3 and a Pass-the-Parcel game was well underway and we didn't want to miss the lollipops and cuppa chups.
As parties go it was a short one, before we knew it the cake was gone, Rolf had stopped for the last time, the 20 layers of the parcel had been unwrapped, the major prize,a frisbee and two sweeties was won, the hostess was kissing everyone good bye and the host thanking us for coming. The next carpet was going to roll out and be a Rave party, We decided we would have dinner. It was 11pm after all and Brown's cafe was going to stop serving soon.
,
WETHERBY
http://www.wetherbyfestival.co.uk/ hardly speaks volumes for the weekend's events so my summation below of Saturday's events back home in Wetherby will be much more tailored to our experience.
Gail managed to ascertain there was a Barbershop group and also a womens choir singing in town on a rolling basis through various pubs. I listened to the barbershop lads do a set in the 3Pub. Gail went on to spend the morning being a groupie to them while I went to Sheffield for some hopefully beneficial advice relating to a business idea I had. It turns out we both had a good time but Gail didn't take any other photos and I had no camera but I've already put one business meeting in this blog entry so that's enough.
Later that night, still as part of Wetherby Live we went with David and Carolyn (neighbours) to what was later described as a secret gig. Secret because it was reached by walking through the gravestones and beneath the St James church deep underground in the crypt. Two bands and three comics made the absolute most of the cramped location. We are old hands having been to a gig there before. It only happens once a year though. Well worth the wait.
The bloke on the left with the guitar is Dexter Dexterous and the fuzzy ones are the Fingersmiths.
You can look them up on myspace but I can tell you the sound they make live is far better than their recorded files there. This is one tight and entertaining group. I do like good brass and these guys and the gal were every bit as strong as the guitar and bass, all carried by a solid and intuitive drummer. I may have heard better but it's been a long time if I have. We all enjoyed their far too short set a lot, despite a early and persistent interruption by their aparrently regular support act, technical difficulties.
Dexter was also a dab hand at the reverb boosted acoustic which he used to bring funk into the 21st century.
Now on to the Devils Jukebox. What can I say, these Harmonium playing ukulele backed washtub based folk were the reason we booked the tickets because we saw them last year here. They did the same set, a bit raunchier and comedic this time and still fantastically entertaining. They also have a myspace site and again their live performances are far more OTT and sound acres better.
There is no need for me to say any more about this act as I blogged it last year but these photos set the mood a bit better. I relented from taking the full frontal nudity picture for which I am sure you are grateful.
The three comics had a set between the bands and , despite the fear that they may have been cringeworthy, far from it, they were crisp funny and topical, the audience was very sharp and gave as good as they received which added to the whole.
And that's it for this week but next week we are going to Leeds on the Beach, Test Space Kitchen at Temple Works ..... no I have no real idea what that is going to be either until we go, can't wait.
