more bigger snacks now!
I was, rather against my will, over at the Brick Lane Music Hall on friday, essentially to recover some lanterns that had been left in the rig there for two and a half years, and which, apparently, the gig I have been on today could not do without. The main reason that they had been left in was that they were positioned on top of the high lighting trusses which run the full length of the building on either side. These trusses are not accessible at all points, which makes rigging awkward. When I spoke to the proprietor and told him that I was coming in to remove these instruments, I told him that I would be bringing a truss monkey to speed things up. When I turned up with said truss monkey, a very nice former student of mine, the greatest living exponent of music hall asked me with great puzzlement; 'Why did you need to bring someone else? I thought you had a truss monkey.''He is the truss monkey,' I replied. I am still trying to work out what he thought I meant in the first place.
Today I have been working at the home of Blubena (tm), I had forgotten how massively bureaucratic their procedures were, in order to be issued with your contractors pass, you have to fill out duplicate A4 sheets, read a health and safety booklet, sign in triplcate and tear out the last page, watch a video, and finally go to another part of the building where a security guard painfully copies (by hand) all the information contained on one of the sheets of A4. Whilst standing in line, (as you might imagine, it takes quite a while for 15 people to be processed), I actually read my health and safety handbook and was somewhat baffled to notice among the list of mandatory safety equipment was a shepherds crook. I can understand hard hats and safety goggles, but this item hasn't featured in my working experience so far.
I am truly grateful that I am not expected to attend the actual conference, there is a three hour workshop and brainstorming session on Horlicks for example. The funny thing is, when you meet these people under ordinary circumstances, they all seem quite normal, it's only when they get together that wierdness ensues. We have a room full of cement mixers and miscellaneous construction equipment, and another where the floor has been marked out as a football pitch, these are presumably laboured marketing analogies, it all goes straight over my head I'm afraid.
posted by Lampy @ 9/11/2006 06:36:00 pm
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