Nine Lives

Well, I’ve just had the most fantabulosy weekend. I’ve been yacht sailing down the Cornish coast and it was exactly what I needed. It was quite serendipitous – I was feeling a bit jaded and a bit exhausted after the relentless demands of this random stray cat that seems to have adopted me, and I needed a break. A friend called me on Friday morning and suggested taking the yacht out over the weekend. At first I thought that to escape the vortex that is Broadway was something I couldn’t do, even if I’d wanted to – but then I realized that a break such as this was exactly what I needed.

So, before you could say ‘Living In A Box’ I was on my way to Plymouth, accompanied by a good friend of mine who was also feeling weary of indulgence and likewise needed to get away. This friend is the film-maker who filmed various people's feet the night before, and we’d both been feeling that the excesses of Thursday night’s ‘Unleashed’ experience needed to be erased. We both thought that an escape to the briny sea was just what the doctor ordered. We were excited; we were going on holiday. We had both wriggled and squirmed ourselves free of the Broadway straightjacket and yet we both - umbilically connected to our base as we are - felt that we were each taking a little bit of Nottingham with us too. It felt like therapy; like a comfort blanket; a talisman.

The sailing was excellent – a nice lazy beat down to Fowey in scorching sunshine on the Saturday; a rather hectic run back with a strong tailwind which constantly threatened to gybe the boat without so much as a cat’s blink of notice, on the Sunday. Actually, I spent two hours at the helm coming back and it felt like ten. Continual wrestling with the wheel (as the wind tries to push you in the wrong direction, making it feel like trying to steer a shopping trolley on an ice rink) is hard work I can tell you.

We had a spectacular moment of artistic flamboyance when the film-maker decided to fly his parachute (which he had somehow remembered to pack) from the stern of the boat, whilst filming it. The captain and I held onto the lines while the chute fluttered and cavorted in the wind behind us, like the silver banner in Priscilla Queen of the Desert. We were passing a Cardinal buoy at the time, and the eerie clanging of its bell augmented the pathos and splendour of the scene. We travelled like that for about five minutes (god knows what neighbouring yachts thought of us) before hauling the chute back in, and the camera was switched off. It felt like we had witnessed a great moment in creative mythology.

So, feeling rejuvenated and liberated, we returned home. I felt that a weekend of sleeping and eating healthily (okay, so we failed to cut out the booze, but two out of three ain’t bad) had restored my vitality for life.

But guess who I found lurking outside my flat when I got home? Miaow!