Dunangonanthere!

What a strange sensation... to wake up early, as usual, but to wake up with nothing to worry about!
The move went very well- exhasuting up to the last minute, but what a blessed relief to lock the house of horrors for the last time.
Offsprog Two and myself floated round in the car for a couple of hours; we couldn't leave it as it was full of guitars. But we gobbled up a massive pizza each before driving round to the new gaff for a couple of hours more waiting. The removal guys turned up and the old owners were just finishing off their loading. They just handed us the keys and said, 'Move in, let's not bother waiting for the lawyers, everything's going to be all right'.
And it was.
Hat's off to Rogers Removals, they were brilliant and made it all stress-free and calm.

So on Saturday, Martin came down from Luton and we drove to Leicester, to a venue called the Donkey.
It has a great atmosphere and I'd had an email from a Chefs fan, saying he was coming along with a bunch of his friends.
That seemed much more important than fatigue and actually, it was great to play after two weeks of solid boxing-up and carrying. The sound was crystal-clear, and Gary who runs it, is a great host (he plays sax for The New Beautiful South too). The Chefs fans were great, all smiles and applause.

Halfway through Martin's set he started playing 24 Hours and I went up to sing it but I forgot half the words. The Chefs fans didn't and they put me to shame but at least I had brought loads of old badges to give them.
I don't think I have met so many since we were actually playing all those years ago. In fact I didn't know we had so many even back then!
Martin played brilliantly well, getting sounds out of the Martin guitar that I didn't know were in there.
Perfect gig, really, and I am so glad not to have bottled out with tiredness.

Today, well, the house is stuffed with stuff.
Between us we have emptied 35 boxes and that's it. Later I'll get into the loft and just put the rest up there for now. My chest of drawers wouldn't go up the teensy stairs so it's in the kitchen looking smug; little does it know it's going into storage in a couple of week's time so the kitchen table stops blocking the front door.
A mountain of books blocks the window, and an island of chairs and pans with no place to go has colonised the middle of the kitchen floor.
I have no washing machine yet so I went to the laundrette yesterday, where three thirty-something men folded their clean laundry into big bags, absent-mindedly sniffing their clean t-shirts as they did so.
It's a bit damp and I will have to get Men In to see to that that some time soon.
But Offsprog One came up on moving day to make a raspberry cake, and Offsprog Two's friends all walked in and said 'What a lovely house!', which I could have hugged them for as it's so hard for a teenager to move house.
I feel like I've borrowed the body of a hundred-year-old farm labourer and I look demented, but I don't care: it's done, I'm gone, I'm there.

The future starts now!