04/06/05 I do like to be beside the seaside

I played with the Edinburgh Samba School at Port Seton Gala Day. The locals seemed to like it. They are simple, but happy, folk.
I was playing tamborin and vibra-slap, aka "Twanger". I was slightly concerned that my presence in the band might cause disapproval in some quarters, as my recent rehearsal attendance has been, at best, sporadic.
Fortunately, I played particularly brilliantly and didn't make a mistake, of any description, all day. It was a virtuoso performance of samba brilliance, and many people told me afterwards that they felt greatly privileged to witness it, and that it would prove to be an enduring memory for them.
The Twanger breaks in the 3-1-5-2 sections of Baion did though provoke a certain degree of controversy, as their efficaciousness was cheekily questioned by the band's Mestre Mark. However I am 100% certain that I played the Twanger at the appropriate spot, and that it would be absolutely churlish to criticise me in light of my innovative twanger-ing causing the rest of the band to make an arse of getting back into the groove. It should really be up to the rest of the band to raise their game to adjust to the challenge of playing with such a gifted percussionist.
It's not all a bed of roses being a prodigiously talented instrumentalist like me though. I'm playing next week at the "Gorgie/Dalry Festival" and I daresay people will be expecting me to equal, or ridiculously, even better, my level of performance yesterday. I can feel the mounting pressure already.
God was having a bit of a right old laugh with his weather remote control. He jokingly switched from the "bright, warm sunshine" to "pissing down like stair rods" settings, intermittently all afternoon.
We later retired to Paul & Morag's gaffe for a delightful barbecue
At the back of their house, you open the garden gate and find yourself in a kid's swing park. As a child, this must be roughly on a par in terms of perks, as your parents owning a sweetie shop!
As we all know, the combination of adults, alcohol and a children's swing park are a dangerous mix. At one point, I found myself being spun round sitting in a circular spinning device type thing. I estimate I was spinning at approximately 75 mph, and that my ordeal lasted for about 10 minutes. The Spanish Inquisition guys would have loved this device.
On alighting from the aforementioned torture device, I staggered dizzily around, narrowly avoiding a collision with the slide, and fell over in a heap. Luckily, there were some small children around who helped me, in my time of crisis, by jumping on my chest, and shaking me back and forward. Bless.
I then proceeded to drink rather a lot of wine, and make flippant comments about samba.
I thought Debbie and her friend were going to do a "Fame!" type singing and dancing tribute show for the assembled throng. However, it turned out that they were actually going to see the show "Fame!" at the Festival Theatre in Edinburgh that night, and had decided to get into the spirit of the occasion by wearing legwarmers, headbands and 80s fashion. Apparently, they were the only people in the entire audience who thought this was an appropriate gesture. This is a shocking inditement of humourless Edinburgh theatre goers!
I experienced something similar myself when I turned up in a Nazi uniform at a showing of the film "Schindler's List". I was so embarrassed that I was the only person in the entire audience who thought this was appropriate!
I shared a taxi back with a few others. The taxi seemed to go via Fort William. I'm not 100% certain of this, but it just seemed I was in that taxi for a long, long time.