Rock n' Bowl

Hello there everyone,

I've been working on a blog about my trip to San Francisco but to be honest I haven't got that far with it. In fact I have done a piffling three hundred words. It isn't lack of creative zest, it is simply that I have wanted to give it more time. Time has not been on my hands this week readers. It has been so far away from my hands I imagine it has been residing on my toes. And I wouldn't recommend this as my toes have blisters from my marathon training (though having said that I have well slacked off with my running this week). I also wanted to put up lots of great photos but I need to get them from Emma's mum as she took some really good ones. All the gods have been deciding not to give you a proper blog entry this week.

I thought therefore that I will work on it properly on Sunday evening. Emma will be watching 'Holby City' and I can put fingers to laptop while secretly watching Holby myself. I will then have my amazing San Fran trip all ready and waiting for you in time for the new working week. Going back to work will not be as bad because at least you will have the blog to look forward too. Hopefully this is a win-win thing all round and we are all dancing for joy. Perhaps some of us are even singing a little song? I like to think that this is possible in a world full of so much sadness and pain.

I am having an afternoon coffee now though (it's a nice one. It's black with one sugar as I need the energy rush) so I thought I'd tell you about my trip to the Hollywood Bowl last night. I had always wanted to go this seminal venue. For those of you who don't know it's a 18,000 capacity open air amphitheatre in Hollywood. And it is ruddy superb. You can bring your own drink and food too. How cool is that? No spending ten billion pounds on some chips and a luke warm lager. And you can choose to sit at either a seat with a table, in some normal seats or at the back on the 'bleachers'. It has a seat for all types of dudes! I was with eleven others and we had three terrace boxes next to each other. They were the bomb! I had a whole bottle of wine and got a bit tipsy.

I realised that I didn't tell you that I was seeing Nick Cave and his Bad Seeds with support from Spiritualised and Cat Power. All the acts were ace actually but Nick Cave was flippin' marvelous. The sound was amazing, the light show was superb and the crowd were ace too. I hate it when people say that live music in big venues is rubbish. That's just a lazy opinion as it really works with some acts. Of course it's great to see a band in an intimate setting but there is something to be said for a proper spectacle and show. Mr Cave put one of these on, and he can really play to a big crowd. The setting suited him great and there was no better place to see him.

Afterwards I got a coach home and avoided the famous bad bowl traffic. This coach was part of the 'park and ride' scheme. The great thing was that is bypassed all the congestion and I was back home in Santa Monica in thirty minutes. What was even better was that it dropped me right by my house so I didn't even have to park, I just rode! And for a bargain $5 return (that's about two pounds and eighty pence back in the UK). The powers that be probably didn't think cool cats like me would just ride when they invented this scheme. I think they would have liked my ingenuity though. Why park if you don't need to park. 'Just ride baby' is what I say.

The Hollywood Bowl is now my most favourite venue in the world ever. My friends Jim and Les saw Morrissey there once. I am a bit jealous but I reckon Nick Cave may have been just as good.

More on San Fran soon. And I hope this little blogette has kept you going a bit to the next installment.

Marc x

p.s. Thanks to Charissa for sorting out, and arranging our Nick Cave @ The Bowl trip. It was skill.