An Update on Mr Dickens

Tags

A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens, Ebenezer Scrooge, Lenox, Long Island, Manchester NH, Nashua NH, Winterthur

And so begins another day in isolation, although I have now changed location. As lovely as Manchester NH is, I was getting a little stir crazy in my hotel room, and the view out of the window, across the parking lot was becoming a little stale. Mind you, if I had been at the other side of the hotel I would have been looking across a ball park, with stands, floodlights, giant scoreboards etc. which would have been more fun!

So, an update on the situation: work wise I have lost performances in Nashua, Long Island and at Winterthur, and although I know it would have been completely irresponsible to perform (indeed, I took the initial test because I was concerned about the residents at the Nashua Senior Center being exposed to the virus), and physically I don’t think I would have been able to get through the shows, I still sat in my room feeling so upset for the hundreds of people who had been looking forward to attending. I have had lots of messages of support and sympathy, but I have so missed standing on stage and hearing the laughter and applause, and being a small part of people’s Christmas celebrations.

The good news is that I am no longer testing positive and the recommended period of quarantine from the time of the first symptoms will soon be passed. Speaking of symptoms, one of my regular readers posted a question asking what mine were and are? It started in Lenox, after my Thursday night performance there, and I began to feel as if I were catching a cold, which is nothing unusual during a tour, when the weather is cold (and this year, wet), and I am using a lot of my energy to perform, meaning that my body’s natural defences are low. I have often caught colds in the past, so these very mild symptoms didn’t ring alarm bells at that stage. On Friday morning I set out to drive from west to east towards New Hampshire, and in my uncompleted, and unpublished blog post from that day I wrote:

‘ The day was clear and sunny, showing off The Berkshires in all of their winter glory, as I headed East. In fact, the journey was a bit like an encyclopedia of my touring history, for I passed a great many cities and communities where I have performed in the past: starting at Lenox, of course, then Westfield, I saw a sign for East Deerfield, and then more for Old Sturbridge Village. I passed through Worcester (in fact I could see the hotel where I had stayed just a few days before from the freeway), before skirting Boston, to Lowell (where I had not only performed, but CD visited the city to observe the mills during his first visit to America in 1842), and Salem before heading into New Hampshire, passing Nashua, to where I will be returning on Saturday, and finally to Manchester. If I had continued north, a long way north, I would have reached the Mount Washington Hotel in the heart of the White Mountains. In those early days of touring, I would drive past the Old Man of the Mountain, a huge granite outcrop in the shape of a face, with a hooked nose. The old man took on almost mythical status in the state, and it was with shock and fear that the news was received one morning in 2003 that the whole front of the face had broken away from the cliff and tumbled into the valley below, depriving New Hampshire of an iconic symbol.

‘During the drive I stopped at a Panera Bread restaurant and had one of their Fuji Salads, and by now I could feel my cold taking grip a little more – I thought that I could really have done without this just now’

So, in hindsight, it started there.

The next morning I felt much more debilitated, with my body and head both aching too. Early in the morning I managed to get hold of some testing kits and a thermometer and sure enough there was the second pink line.

Fortunately, I did not have a fever, though. The thermometer’s instructions caused me some angst, in that it told me to press against the very centre of my forehead (that was OK), but then to slowly move it up until it reached the hairline – well, in my case that is quite a long journey, in fact one could say a journey without end! Fortunately there was a suggestion to also move the probe to the neck, just below the ear, which is what I did.

Since the initial test I stayed pretty well in bed for two days, very tired, aching a bit in body and head and found myself sleeping a lot. I was thankful that the football World Cup was in full swing, as that provided some relief. I ordered food to be delivered to the hotel but found that I really didn’t have much of an appetite at all. On Monday afternoon I rebelliously sneaked out of the hotel and in the isolation of my car drove out to a deserted beach and walked on the sands breathing the fresh air. I even ran a little, just a few hundred yards up and down, to see how my lungs were performing, and actually it was OK.

From the beach at Hampton I drove up the coastal road for a while admiring the huge houses there, all twinkling with expensive Christmas decorations. The sight of those decorations made me feel wonderfully Christmassy for the first time in days, but also brought a wave of sadness to me: they represented the celebration of a season that I was not part of, and couldn’t be part of for a while.

Yesterday I drove from New Hampshire towards Pennsylvania, so that I can be close to the remaining venues of the tour and be ready to go if I am feeling physically able. The main issue now is a fairly constant dry cough, and lingering headache, but I am dosing up daily and am feeling better by the day. Bob Byers has been incredibly supportive, of course, putting no pressure on me to to perform, in fact quite the opposite, counselling me to look after myself and not push too hard too soon: he knows me too well!

So, that is the update – many thanks to all of you who have sent messages and comments via social media, I so value your friendship. I have had a messages about the quiz, and even had answer sheets submitted – I will post the complete answers in a couple of days, along with a few explanatory notes

A few more days rest and recuperation and hopefully I will back on stage on Friday!

From VA to MA

Tags

A Christmas Carol, Blue Mountains, Charles Dickens, Charlottesville, Ebenezer Scrooge, Football World Cup, Hertz Car Rental, Laurel and Hardy, Lenox, The Berkshires, Trail of the Lonesome Pine, TSA, Waynesboro

On Tuesday morning I woke on the outskirts of Waynseboro with the sense that I had nowhere to be for quite a while, for this was to be a day off, with only travel to occupy me, and that wasn’t until the afternoon. I had a lazy morning ahead of me and intended to make the most of it by doing as little as possible. I probably should have taken a scenic drive into the National Park and visited some of the ‘cascading waterfalls, spectacular vistas, fields of wildflowers, and quiet wooded hollows’ that the website promised, but the fact was I felt completely empty and used up – this needed to be a ‘floppy day’ in which I re-charged my batteries a little for the next leg. I even found it difficult to write my blog, which isn’t in itself an energetic task, but my brain seemed in need of rest too, and was coming out on strike along with the rest of me!

I did what you would expect me to do, I had breakfast and loaded some laundry into a machine, and when the latter was complete, I set to packing my cases one more. Actually, this was quite an important moment in this year’s tour, for it would be the last time that I needed to squeeze my costumes into the little roller bag, or stuff my top hat with socks and wind my scarf around it. When next I unpacked, I would have no more flights until I go home, meaning that everything I need for my shows will be able to stay in my car.

I had asked the hotel if I could have a late check out, and as midday approached, I made final checks of the room to ensure that I left nothing and loaded my belongings into the black Highlander. I was heading back north.

The drive back to Charlottesville took me on a freeway with stunning views of the mountains to my right, and I began to regret not following The Skyline Drive earlier that morning. At one point I noticed tourist signs directing me to The Blue Ridge Trail, and suddenly I was a child again, putting my favourite 45rpm vinyl disk onto our old record player; I could almost hear the various clicks and whirrs as the mechanism allowed the disk to drop onto the turntable, and then the arm with the little stylus needle at the end swung across and lowered itself with a static ‘click’ perfectly onto the edge of the record. A moment of crackles and then a guitar started to play, followed by a voice: ‘On a mountain in Viriginia stands a lonesome pine…’ Yes, those where certainly the Blue Mountains to my right, and I was definitely in Virginia, so somewhere, it stood to reason, was a trail to a lonesome pine. I used to sing along to that record over and over when I was a child, and just for a few moments as I drove, I could hear Laurel and Hardy’s brilliant performance once more.

The drive to the airport took less than an hour, and I passed the time by listening to BBC news on the radio. At one time there was a traffic report, which described an incident causing delays between Hyde and Ashton-Under-Lyme, which is where I had been performing just a week before! I found a petrol station, filled the tank and then continued to the car rental returns area and walked the short distance into the terminal, where the paperwork would be completed. From the Enterprise desk I walked to the check-in desk, dropped my case, and then made my way to security. No bustle, no crowding, no fuss, just a very small, friendly airport.

Ahead of me at the bag drop was an elderly lady who didn’t seem quite sure what to do, and as I stood behind her, she turned and said ‘Oh, you go ahead, this is my very first time flying, and I am not sure how to do it all’. She had chosen the right airport to make her flying debut at, for everyone, me included, took her under our wings and looked after her. I helped her get the bins to put her bags and things in, and she asked if she could keep her coat on, her purse with her, her shoes on, and I told her that everything needed to go through the x-ray machine. The staff at security were brilliant, also very gently telling her what she needed to put on the conveyor belt. ‘Where do I go after that?’ she asked, ‘Oh, ‘said the kindly TSA officer, ‘we will talk about that on another side of this part, don’t you worry, we will look after you.’ He picked up a metal water bottle from her tray, ‘is this empty?’ he asked, and she replied with a huge sense of pride ‘Yes!’, as if she had passed that part of the test with flying colours. ‘Am I allowed to fill it up again?’ ‘Oh, yes ma’am, there are water stations just through those doors, that’s fine. Which airline are you flying with, ma’am?’ ‘American’. ‘Oh, I think there is a fountain by the American gates, let me check’, and with that he called another officer over, ‘Mack, is there are a water fountain over at the American Airlines gate? This lady is flying for the very first time, and she wanted to know if she can fill her bottle.’ ‘Oh, yes I think that there is. Hey, Bill,’ he called to another staff member, ‘is there a water station up at American?’ The answer came back in the affirmative and was relayed back to the smiling lady. When our bags had been cleared, and we both were putting our coats and shoes on, she said, ‘Thank you all so much for looking after me’ and went off to fill her water bottle at the American Airlines gate. I hoped for her sake that there would some equally kindly and friendly people at the next airport, which would probably be a huge, heaving, hub of humanity all rushing to be somewhere else as quickly as possible, maybe not seeing, certainly not caring about the scared elderly lady for whom all of this was an alien experience.

I had an hour or so before my flight, so I bought some lunch and listened to the BBC’s radio coverage of the build-up to the important football match in Qatar, England vs Wales, the very first time that two home nations (England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland) had played each other in a World Cup tournament. Unfortunately for me, the USA were also playing their final qualifying match against Iran, so any TVs that were showing the tournament were tuned to that encounter, But still, I had my radio commentary, or at least I did right up to the moment that the whistle blew to start the game, at which a pre-recorded voice informed me that ‘due to copyright issues you are unable to listen to this content in your present location’. And that was that! I had to follow the match by a rolling text report.

The flight back to Washington DC lasted for only 20 minutes, and by the time I was in the toytown terminal A and making my way towards the grown-up terminal D, England had scored three goals and ensured that they would finish at the top of their group and progress to the next stage. Meanwhile, the USA had a one goal lead over Iran, and needed to hold onto it if they were also to progress. Fortunately, they did win, meaning that they also progressed to the next stage.

My next flight was to Hartford, Connecticut and once more it was very busy. The clerk at the gate asked if anyone would like to check their roller bags, as the bin space would be very limited, and I offered mine. As a thank you, I was allowed to board with Group 2, rather than having to wait for my original allocation of Group 3 to be called, the irony being that there was so much space in the bins when I boarded that I could easily have taken my bag!

It was another short flight, under an hour, and soon I was reunited with both of my bags and was making my way to the Hertz counter where I was introduced to my companion for the rest of the trip – a Grey Hyundai Sante Fe, loaded it up and set off towards Lenox in The Berkshires.

This will be my 5th trip to Lenox. but I have never approached it from the Hartford region before, nor in the dark. I put the address of the hotel into my phone, 70 Lenox Road, and dutifully followed the instructions. The route didn’t take me on freeways, but through small towns and along winding country roads, which meant a lot more concentration, especially in the rural areas where my eyes were scanning the woodlands for any movement that may presage a deer leaping into the road in front of me. The towns, on the other hand, were beautiful, with colourful Christmas lights lining the way.

The drive took about 1 hour and 20 minutes, but at last I was approaching my destination, the Courtyard by Marriott hotel just outside Lenox, and yet still I did not recognise anything. I began to panic slightly when driving along a dark road my satnav app announced that I had arrived at my destination, or rather just said ‘Done!’ and abandoned me. I had a horrible thought that somehow I had entered an incorrect address – I could be anywhere! I wasn’t even aware of crossing the state line, and for all I knew I could be in some far-flung corner of Connecticut, miles, and hours, from where I should be – I had simply followed the screen rather than having any knowledge of where I actually was. I pulled over, and checked the address, and sure enough I had clicked on an address in New Lenox Road, rather than Lenox Road. I nervously re-entered the address and waited to see how long it would take me to get my hotel, and I can’t tell you the relief when it came up ‘6 minutes’

Soon I was on a road I knew, and there, on a hill to my left, was the Courtyard. I checked in, purchased a microwavable meal of pasta and meatballs to have in my room, and brought a day of travel from VA to MA to an end.

Don’t Break a Leg!

Tags

A Christmas Carol, Applebbe's, Beechwood Hotel, Best Western, Byers'Choice, Charles Dickens, Courtyard by Marriott, Ebenezer Scrooge, Lenox, London, McDonalds, Pleasant Valley Nature Reserve, The Country Cupboard

Monday was all mine to do as I liked in. So, long as by the end of it I ended up in Lewisburg Pennsylvania, I had no timetable or agenda.

Throughout the tour so far, the weather has been clear, bright, cold and beautiful and when I pulled opened the curtains, I fully expected to be greeted by the same sight that Ebenezer Scrooge saw on Christmas day: ‘No fog. No mist, but clear, bright, shining, golden sunlight’, unfortunately, it was the opposite to that, for there was a low, misty cloud hanging low over the mountains and the ground glistened wet from a light, but steady rainfall. But I was not going to let a little rain upset my morning. I am from Britain – we ‘do’ rain there.

I went down to the lobby and once again ordered the yoghurt, granola and fruit bowl. Due to staffing issues all hotels are struggling to provide the full service and at The Courtyard in Lenox there was only a very limited breakfast menu. It is the same with housekeeping services, every hotel that I have stayed in has informed me on check-in that there is no housekeeping service available, and if there is anything specifically that I need, I should ask at the front desk.

I took my breakfast to a table and removed my mask as I ate, and as I sat another man arrived and went through the process of ordering his. Once he had made his selection, the lady behind the counter asked if he would like it on a tray or in a bag. He asked her to repeat what she had said, so she replied, ‘would you like it in a bag?’ ‘What?’ he barked back at her. ‘A BAG!’ she repeated. ‘Madam, if you insist on not removing your mask, I cannot hear what you say!’ At which he grabbed his breakfast items and stomped off to a table where he angrily consumed his morning feast. It all seemed a trifle unnecessary.

Back in my room I had a fair amount of admin to do, not only sorting out details for forthcoming shows, but also liaising with Bob Byers about booking the Covid test that I am going to need before flying home in a week’s time. He had managed to find a testing station that will tie in with my various events towards the end of the week and booked an appointment for me at a convenient time.

Work finished, I packed up my cases and at 10.00 left the room. It was still drizzling outside, but I wanted my morning of fresh air and exercise, so I followed the road signs that I had noticed the day before to the Pleasant Valley Nature Reserve. The narrow road took me through woodland, where there were wonderful remote houses hiding away, and then slowly rose uphill. The surface looked muddy, but soon I realised that it was quite hard-packed ice, and the wheels were slipping and spinning: AT LAST! I could engage the All-Wheel Drive system which had thus far been redundant.

I reached the entrance to the reserve and as the office was closed on a Monday, I just took myself in and began to explore. There was a large map displayed and it showed that there were various trails, of different lengths, winding through the woodland and up onto the mountain side, so I just followed the signs and plunged into the undergrowth. It was still damp and the mist hang low over the trees, creating some mysterious and menacing views.

Some of the trails were closed due to storm damage, so I simply followed where I could. Eventually I started to climb, over rocks and branches and streams, and as I got higher, so the ice and piles of hardened snow covered more of the ground. Although this was a nature reserve, I didn’t see any animals or birds, although there was an occasional screech from far away.

As I climbed higher, and began to slip on some of the rocks, I began to think that maybe I had pushed my luck too far, for if I slipped and fell, breaking a leg, I would be alone on the side of a mountain, with no help for miles around. It was time to return to the car, and I very cautiously clambered back down until I saw a gleam of deep red through the trees.

And now it was time to drive. The journey to Lewisburg would take 4 and a half hours, and it was now 12pm. I set the SatNav unit, and left Lenox for another year. The route took me along some beautiful roads, which skirted the mountain, giving me some incredible views, despite the low cloud. I was very surprised after not long driving to discover myself crossing the state line into New York, I had no idea that it was so close, and soon I was joining the New York Throughway, a road that runs straight down the middle of the state. There were signs to Albany, Buffalo (I thought of the lovely elderly couple in The Beechwood Hotel in Worcester), Syracuse and even, at one intersection, Montreal.

After a while I pulled into a rest center and feasted on a McDonalds, before filling my little rouge Rogue up with fuel and continuing southwards passed through The Catskills and later on, when I had made it to Pennsylvania, over The Poconos.

For company I was still listening to the various podcasts about the forthcoming Ashes series, but eventually my phone lost any signal and instead I started playing my Christmas playlist, which actually I haven’t listened to much on this trip. There were all my old friends, Nat King Cole, Johnny Mathis, Bing, Lucy Rose, The Beach Boys, The Peanuts (via Vince Guaraldi) and the rest, who accompanied me across The Susquehanna River and to the very familiar Best Western hotel at The Country Cupboard store.

I checked in (being told that there was no housekeeping service) and made my way through seemingly endless corridors to the room that they always give me here, a large room with a whirlpool bath! As soon as I was settled, I ran the taps and let it fill, which took a long time (in fact it took a very long time, because I hadn’t closed the plug properly, and when I came to check the water was barely covering the bottom of the bath). Eventually it filled and I luxuriated in a bubbling, frothing tub!

Later in the evening I took myself to a nearby Applebee’s restaurant and dined on a Cajun Salmon dish (although the ‘Cajun’ aspect seemed somewhat lacking) and finished off with a very rich chocolate pud. The restaurant was filled with lots of rowdy locals, and I sat quietly at my corner table, minding my own business, watching, observing. Three guys sat at the bar, two had baseball caps on back to front, whereas the other wore his the right way round, and I wondered if there were any hierarchy involved, or if the one guy didn’t want to conform the stereotype of the other two. Actually, of course, it was just three guys wearing hats, but the musings passed a little time!

When I returned to the hotel it was windy and there was a little rain whipping about in the air, but soon I was inside and and settled down for the night, ready to perform twice at The Country Cupboard store on Tuesday.

An afterthought: when I arrived at the hotel I was chatting to Liz online, and she asked me to tell her a joke. Not able to think of anything on the spur of the moment, I quickly searched online and, among a few others, I found this: Q: What did Charles Dickens keep in his spice rack? A: It was the best of thymes and it was tye worst of thymes!