Duvet and mattress, porcelain loo -
Are absent from Greenbelt and its campers, who
Make do without, all weekend long.
They shiver by night, and by day: pong.

My tenth year attending was worth my while -
Jude Simpson’s wit made my face smile.
Milton Jones – the one-liner King.
Dave Walker’s scribbling kept me giggling.

Roger McGough – a poetry machine;
He once helped to write: Yellow Submarine!
That beat-boxing Shlomo, the epitome of cool.
Rev Gerald A. boldly broke every rule.

Remember from Blue Peter, Simon Thomas?
His main stage compering was fab, I promise.
Went with my hubbie to a ‘talk’ in Bethlehem:
“Affluenza’s what we’ve got!” declared Oliver James.

Zic Zazou – very… French – noisy too.
Beer and Hymns (overheard from nearby queue).
Free tea from Speakers’ Lounge – totally fantastic.
First visit to Blue Nun – four quid for wine in a cup of plastic!

Fried potato, wine gravy… sausage perched on top.
I tend to scoff this every year – I like it quite a lot.
But now it’s all over – Greenbelt ‘adieu’.
Back to duvet and mattress, porcelain loo.

 

Last year my GB poem won me a box of pies through the post!
As you can see, this year I’m expecting signed photos/t-shirts/CDs/books/all-inclusive holidays, etc, from all the ’stars’ that are named.
I’ve briefed the postman that his job will become that bit more demanding over the next couple of weeks. It’s just a matter of waiting now.

Some info/pics re my previous talks at GB here.

My GB 2010 pics here.

An ‘official’ GB pic of me here (typical – the photographer came to our talk, took lots of pics, and this is the one they choose… of me freaking out as Peter had just decided that it would be a clever idea to kiss me for a photo, which made me go bright red, naturally)!

Yes, in a mere 4 weeks time, my family and I will be playing the game: ‘How much camping gear can you cram into 1 car, and still have room for the kids?’ as we head off to Cheltenham Racecourse… not to bet on the horses, but to enjoy August Bank Holiday weekend at the largest Christian Arts Festival in Europe… Greenbelt!

And I’m speaking there again this year… this will be the 8th consecutive year that they’ve been crazy enough to ask me back!

Here are a few pics from past talks (click them to enlarge)… some were as part of the ‘literary’ stream, some in connection with Generous:

2003 – first met the fab-tastic Penny Culliford, both involved with the ‘writer’s surgery’ in the inflatable church!

2004 – Penny and I doing: Bridget Jones Gets God!

2006 – a lot of talks/workshops/interviews in the Generous ‘zone’, a highlight being interviewing Janey Lee Grace, see pic here.

2008 – Me kindly allowing someone else to have their say during a Generous talk (perhaps I wasn’t feeling well)

2009 – Jac and I continue to urge people to Go Generous:

Doing this post is planting an idea in my head about having an entire page on this website, dedicated to Greenbelt-related this n that. This page has some GB stuff on already, but perhaps GB ought to have the honour of a page all of its own.
It’s the Summer hols and I’m off work for 5 and a half weeks… so no excuse not to attempt this, darn it.
I could dazzle you with my award-winning Greenbelt poetry. (Blogged a poem about the pies at GB… pie company found it, and awarded me with a large box of pies through the post, worth over £50… yum yum!).

Last year’s Generous talk (me and Jac) is available to buy here as an MP3… only listen to if you can cope with my very poor jokes relating to fair trade bananas and compost toilets. Seriously – very very poor.

Anyway, if you’re Greenbelting this Summer, call in to The Kitchen on Saturday, 2-3:30pm. The details of the talk/workshop/session/whatever are yet to be finalised. OK, granted… we haven’t actually started with the planning yet, but with 4 weeks to go, it’s quite likely we will, one day soon (myself and 2 very biblical-sounding guys: Peter and Paul).

And watch out for those pies… see if they inspire your creative juices to flow… then watch out for the postman struggling to your door with a large box of freebies…!

Yes, my writing career has reached the giddy heights of being… paid in pies. For some writing. A poem, in fact. A pie poem I posted on this blog after tasting some rather heavenly pies at Greenbelt this summer, here.

The pieminister people found it, put it in their winter newsletter and paid me by sending a box of their fine pies (worth about fifty quid!).

Poetry isn’t really my thing (which you’ll be nodding your head in agreement with if you’ve read the poem in question!) but now I’ve been paid for a poem, even paid in pies, I am going to consider myself a professional poet (as surely when one is paid for their craft they can be considered a professional?!).

Have jested with hubbie that although he may be the primary breadwinner of our family… I am now the pie-winner.
(It’s such rib-tickling humour that keeps our marriage alive, I’m sure.)

So, I’m a poet. A pie poet. A pie-ate.
Anyway, the aforementioned pies are now napping in my freezer, waiting to be re-awakened on some future occasion (xmas day breakie perhaps?).
Yum scrum.

Delivery of box of pies piccies here.

I am quite chuffed to be a part of the latest podcast on the Greenbelt website… all about Christmas and being ‘Generous’ etc.
You can listen to it here

It seems but a lifetime away, but before the memory fades altogether, being extinguished by thoughts of xmas and suchlike, just wanted to put in a couple of links:

here is what the GB website came up with this year. Interesting, as they’d asked for a biog, I’d sent them one… then they chose to ignore it and use one they’d had from 2005! Thus, it mentions that I work on the mags I used to work on, that are now extinct.
They had one back in 2005, when I was doing more literary stuff there, rather than eco (I’ve done ’something’ there every year since then I think, for my sins).

My this year’s talk has also been recorded, which is a 1st. Either they just got carried away and decided to record all talks this year… or it was my fair trade banana jokes that forced them to make my talk available to be inflicted on the masses. Hmmmm..
It’s available for buying here, should anyone be interested.

They weren’t really ‘fair trade banana’ jokes, as such things don’t exist, as far as I am aware. They were just ‘regular’ banana jokes, that I shamelessly used, and asked people to assume the bananas in question were, indeed, fairly traded… so that my jokes would bear some relevance on my talk.

There was also some toilet humour (that linked in with the concept of ’sponsoring a toilet’ in a developing country)…have a strong suspicion that next year I’ll be asked, nay, begged, to be on main stage, delivering my FT banana/loo jokes to vast crowds of laughing (or groaning) greenbelters.
Oh yes.

Greenbelt Ministry

I was ministered to at Greenbelt.
In an unexpected way
I had to queue to get it
Ye highlight of my day

My fellow queuers clearly
Had received such love before
It was painted on their faces;
Eager, smiling… wanting more

I knew I’d made the perfect choice
Joined this queue – this one alone
My happy fate approacheth
Secret fantasies finally known.

Heidi was my pie of choice
Goats cheese and potato sweet
(Pretentious and middle class)
Though Moo and Blue looked fab to eat

And how I loved the taste
Of the pretentious middle-class
It hugged my soul so very tight
My expectations were surpassed.

Lo, the pie was not alone
Yet adorned with a dollop of mash
Not as grim as at school meals
Miles advanced of that trash

To make it even more divine
Gravy was poured on top
Though they had named it ‘groovy’
How very quaint is this shop?

There were no lies abounding
Groovy was at the core
‘Tis why I gave up six pounds fifty
And considered coming back for more

Heidi was now my one true love
(Hubby could have cause for concern
But then he’s never had a Heidi
Not as far as I’ve known)

The pies that they were out of
Were blessed with a little note
‘Gone to pie heaven’
A very groovy quote

It seems they’re Made in Banksy-land
Rather than Hong Kong
Formerly known as Bristol
Where queues are just as long

At the Belt that’s made of Green
A queue is so the norm
If Brits are fairly into queues
It’s for what Greenbelter’s are born

We queue to get in on day one
For talks and music too
We stand and wait, then waiteth some more
We even queue to poo

So if they tried to sell their pies
In lands far far from here
Would people queue up orderly?
Would anarchy appear?

A tiny prick of tears is formed
When one is forced to think
Of worried pies, of Heidi’s cries
With anarchy on the brink

When my body’s all queued out
And numbered are my days
Pie Heaven’s where I’m destined
My ticket is One Way

pieminister (the pie shop’s name)
Will dominate the place
Pies will be free; queues will be gone
Pie smiles on every face

They’ll be no tears nor pain nor fear
Due to pies for all the hours
Clouds made from mash will float on by
And rain down groovy showers

The Lord of the Pies will sort me out
Heidi greet me at the Pie-ly Gate
I will scoff and not grow weary
Munch pies, and not be faint

—————————————————

Please note, this poem is not sponsored by pieminister, and I live at least an hour away from Bristol.
Feel free to view my GB piccies here

a very nice lady from CEL sent me some piccies of the generous session I did at GB this year (see previous post for details) and they are here (in one of them it really looks like i’m picking my nose but i like to think i was just giving it a good scratch, but you can judge for yourself!)

i have also just found this piccie from GB 07, generous area, when i interviewed Janey Lee Grace (author and used to be in Wham!).

finally, whilst wandering around flicker i found this piccie of someone with their v fave books balanced on their head, and one of them was dearbob, so am dead chuffed!!

off to Greenbelt a wk today – hurray!

am doing 1 session this year, in ‘the kitchen’, SAT 2-3:30pm, with my good friend Claire.
It’s called ’still living generously’ and is all about generous, in case that wasn’t obvious!

looking forward to things being a lot more chilled this year… hurrah-hooray. (as in, i’m not doing too much)

if anyone’s interested, i have a adult wknd ticket to GB that i’d be willing to sell for a bargain price!

this piccie is of tilly up a tree in the nearby park (she is just poking out of the top)… who says kids don’t climb trees any more?! (click on it to enlarge)

i didn’t realise this, but you can show people yr facebook album, even if they’re not ‘in the club’!
so, here is my greenbelt 07 facebook album, for you poor deprived ones who are still aren’t in the gang!

Jude Simpson, performance poet of whom i am a huuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuge fan (and who i have got to know a bit over past year or so, via greenbelt and email) has put these poems/films on youtube… please listen/watch… they are something else!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FafTnjEo5Pc

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9jW1HpPhnpg&mode=related&search=

yes, the greenbelt piccies aren’t finished yet… here is Tilly, v involved with her clay sculpture for the ‘city of clay’ thingy. They loved doing this… did a similar thing last year i think. And i love it that greenbelt has this sort of thing on offer… so random… so fun… and sorta meaningful too!
Fraser behind her, with his back to us… his sculpture was a more private matter, clearly!

(the title of this post was supposed to resemble ‘daydream believer’ by the Monkeys. i am telling you this just in case you are not a big a monkey’s fan as i am!)

Tomorrow is my last day of school… for 5 and 1/2 weeks!
yes, i know this makes me sound like a 12 year old (i am an LSA, in case you didn’t know!)

That said, as well as being off work for that long, i’ve also got to amuse the kids for that long, as hubbie is working lots at the mo.

I think i’ll try to balance computer games, dvds, playing in garden, cycling, trips to beach, descending on my unsuspecting parents… etc etc.
should be ok.

and not long till Greenbelt now… hurrah!
i’ve recently finished working on the ‘talks’ rota for the generous area
i’m v much looking forward to attending a lot of the talks… let alone the rest of the greenbelt festivities!

i have a slight tan now, due to the smashing dose of global warming weather we’re having… i still look fairly anaemic when standing next to most of my v tanned friends, but for ME, compared to MY normal colour, i’m doing well.

may the sunshine continue (but may it still rain at night often so my veggie patch doesn’t suffer!)

yes, i am now one of those who WANTS rain so it can benefit my veg. I used to think this was a v ‘old person’ mentality, but either it’s not, or i’m now v old. Please don’t try to figure that one out for me… i think i know the answer!

was v pleased that Greenbelt had awarded me with tanned feet and legs…

… until just had bath, which exposed the fact that Greenbelt had in fact awarded me with v dirty feet and slightly stubbly (unshaved) legs… and no tan.

i think i might sue.

(more in depth comment on GB later, when got head together and unpacked, etc!)

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see my fave pics

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i have this fantasy that certain men will come to my ‘prefer ikea to church?!’ workshop (ethical shopping uncovered) at Greenbelt. No, it’s not what you’re thinking, as i’m happily, nay, super-happily married!

Fantasy no.1: Bono and Bob turn up. Well, they’ve both been to GB before and they just decided to pop in this year, unannounced. Headed straight for my workshop, of course. They love it. They want me to join them in their quest for… all that stuff they do, and i end up on telly as their trusty sidekick, etc etc.

Fantasy no 2: Leo Hickman turns up. He is actually at GB, but as he’s pretty much a celeb (writes for the Guardian, written best-selling ethical living books) he’ll prob just arrive for his session, do it, and leave, as they usually do. But anyway, in my fantasy he heads straight for my workshop, of course. He loves it. He wants me to join him in his… errr… writing for the Guardian and other ethical writing that makes me rich and famous, naturally.

Thing is, only reason i can actually admit these fantasies to you is that i’ve thought it thru quite a bit, to the extent where i realise that i genuinely won’t mind if only 1 person turns up to my workshop (even if they’re v unfamous!) and i get to chat with them about the issues, and encourage them, and be encouraged by them… this would be enough for me. I had to think about if i really meant that, but i really do. And because of this, i feel able to share with you my bizarre fantasies about me being thrown into the world of being a famous…. errr… person who has a lot to say about ethical shopping (and about most things, obviously!)

Fantasy 3: my smashing sexy hubby turns up to my workshop. He loves that I’ve tried my best, even if he then proceeds to tell me all the things I could possibly have improved, just a tad. He doesn’t actually have the ability to launch my TV career and world tour, but he gives me a hug and asks if i want to go to the Tiny Tea tent with him later.

Yes, that’s far more realistic, and when i come to think of it… it’s my fave fantasy of all.
Smashing.
Roll on GB… !

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