A Winter's Tale......

Has it really been over a month since I wrote anything blog-wise?  Yes dear friends, it has indeed....due to lots of work (a good thing though) and silly weather which stopped play, cancelled our club, and meant me getting cabin fever after being stuck in the house for days on end....well 3 but that's long enough. 

So January was dreary, pretty much fun-less (is that a word?) and snow-ridden.  February will be better.  Work is looking interesting, my finances are looking better, and there are things to do that don't involve risking life & limb on the icy Crouch End streets and facing my ice-phobia.

This weekend saw a day out in Brixton.  I hadn't had much experience of Brixton since the late 80s/early 90s.  Firstly visiting a friend from back home who had a nanny job there (& little naive me walking the streets of Brixton past lots of unsavouries early in the morning), and then during my dreadlock period when an associate (I won't call her a friend) lived in a squat and I stayed there many a time.  The squat was actually a lovely house, with lovely big rooms, electric & people that looked after it for years before they were finally evicted.

The Brixton of 2013 is pretty much unrecognisable from those days I mention above.  Gone seem to be the drug dealers on Coldharbour Lane and not being able to walk 2 foot out of the tube station without being offered something illegal, and instead in comes Brixton Village (previously Brixton Market) with its great places to eat & drink, and quirky little independent stores.  Some locals might not have improved of the big change but it had to happen.  It now feels a warm, friendly place, with a touch of Shoreditch about it.  We had lunch in a tapas bar called 7 Brixton & I loved it - Tortilla, King Prawns & Tomato Bread, washed down with a Rhubarb cocktail and a Mojito...Jake Bugg playing in the background.  Thanks to kindly Miss Warren, two vintage dresses purchased in a little boutique for £10 each, and the biggest piece of mango cake you've ever seen from Sponge & Cream.  We've all said we will be back to continue our gastro mission, when it's warmer!

I should add that we didn't just go all the way to Brixton for tapas.  We had infact done the trek to see Taboo at the Brixton Clubhouse.  I'd seen Taboo in the West End many a moon ago but it was still fun to see it again with a new cast.  The venue was tiny but, as before, done out in the style of a sleazy old nightclub (as it should be) with the cast sitting around.  After googling on my return home, I find that lots of the cast have literally just left stage school which is pretty amazing as their talent is immense.  Big things in store for all of them I'm sure.  "Philip Sallon" looked so much like the real thing that my friend asked if it was actually him, "Leigh Bowery" was amazing, and we all fell in love a bit with "Marilyn".  If you go and see the show (currently extended until the end of March), be warned you may well get picked on and, god forbid, get dragged up on stage!  We luckily managed to avoid eye contact and humiliation for the entire show....but you may not!!!!  RIP Leigh Bowery.

Weekend's fun done....roll on the next one where I shall hopefully be going to an exhibition and the new Crouch End Record Club.  I will report back on both!