No really. I am a dork. I’ve always been so keen on reading that I remember the summer I was 12 there was a reading competition at the local library (which I also volunteered at because I love to alphabetize). In one month you had to read as many pages as possible. Now I’m not only a nerd but I’m a competitive one and I threw myself into the competition with vigour that would shock you. I came in first. To put it in perspective, the boy who came in second read something like 384 pages. I came up with an incredible number, not only in its unusualness, but in the sheer total it was. In that month I read 11,111 pages. Really. I am that much of a geek.
I had a girlie expedition this weekend. Without toddlers. Without make-up. And without feeling in my fingers, but more on that later.
We went to Hay-on-Wye to see the Hay Book Festival. That’s right, you read that right. We went to see an entire festival about books. Books. Books and books and more books.
(Give me a minute to compose myself here.)
Right then. I went to the Hay Festival
And I went with these two lovely ladies, Hairy Farmer Family Wife and Nuts In May (she’s a very happy, cheerful person. She’s also anonymous out here, so I’m symbolizing her happiness below).
It was fantastic. Books are fantastic. Authors who are there with their books are fantastic, if by “fantastic” I mean “writhing with envy that they are published thereby living out my dream”. I was a bit late getting there so missed my first gig, which was to see David Eagleman, but I saw plenty of others. We even ran into a number of non-authors, like Rob Brydon (forever in my mind as Uncle Bryn).
I also literally crossed paths with The Man Who Would Be the Leader of Labour, Ed Miliband, or at least he will be leader if he defeats his somewhat more creepy brother David.
I also bumped into (again, literally) a rather rainy, water-logged Robert Winston. I wanted to weep copiously and hug him fiercely to my bosoms and thank him for his enormous contributions in his pioneering work in IVF. I wanted to pull out my phone and show him the wallpaper on it, which is a photo of a sleeping Nick and Nora. I wanted to tell him I owed him everything but, short of having him autograph a test tube, I thought maybe he was over weeping and hormonal women like me thanking him for his reproductive breakthroughs.
Signing books was Quentin Blake, the man who did the fantastic illustrations for the Roald Dahl books. It was lovely to see him, although strangely I did see a dad who jumped the queue, exclaiming “I’ve been here for an hour! My kids need this!” Brilliant, mate. You’ve not only jumped the queue in front of other kids, but you’ve used your children as collateral in a lesson they will now know as “Gee kids, you can make excuses and act like an outrageous asshole just to get what you want!”
And I got to see an interview with one of my favorite authors, Kazuo Ishiguro, whose book Never Let Me Go haunts me to this day (and I just got my hands on his book The Unconsoled, which I think will further haunt me).
HFF and May saw Kazuo with me, and later the three of us also sat in on an interview with Giles Coren (whose new book I need. Need, I say, need!) Giles Coren is known as the man who wrote the angriest email in Britain, due to an editor removing an “a” before a word. I don’t know about that, but I do know that we were nearly pissing ourselves with laughter. He’s one frenetic, hilarious man.
Then HFF and I saw a performance by Beth Orton, which has to go down as one of the strangest concerts I’ve ever seen. She kept getting lost and saying “Sorry, I’m so fucking unprofessional.” Um…ok….
I had hired us a tent for the night from a company called Tangerine Fields, which supplies tents and air mattresses and important things in my land like flushable toilets.
Our tent was roomy and lovely, with our own little sleeping pods to snooze in. HFF and May got to the site before me, so had chosen their pods. I was pleased with their choices, as my pod was to the left of the tent door and surely an insane non-literate (hence their presence at the festival) psycho would almost certainly not turn left and get me first, right?
She might kill me now, but HFF is a fair example of just how bloody cold it was sleeping out there.
What can I say, it was a bank holiday weekend in rainy Wales, of course it was going to be cold? I hadn’t really realized just how cold it would be, though. I once stayed in the Ice Hotel in the Arctic Circle, northern Sweden. I remember being so cold I honestly thought that the end of the world had come. Inside my polar sleeping bag (which lay on top of reindeer skins inside a molded ice sculpture of a Viking boat) I thought I was undead I was so cold. The side of my mouth was stuck to the side of the bag courtesy of moisture and I had curled up on my side like a prawn during the night, and found I couldn’t then unstretch courtesy of the pocket of freezing air that had pooled in the bottom of my bag. Although I was in no Viking bed, this visit in Wales was no different and at some point in the night I stuffed all my clothes in the bag with me and was attempting not to freeze to death.
I couldn’t stay long the next morning, so once I peeled my frozen form out of my sleeping bag, had some coffee and a breakfast bun with the girls, I did a few things and then hit Ikea in Bristol, as we have a gardening corner to get ready (should the sun ever actually come out, that is.)
I picked up some Stripey Horse books for the twins and I got a few books myself, namely the new one by Shappi Khorsandi and I caved and bought Patrick Ness’s Knife of Never Letting Go, even though it’s listed as a kid’s book (for comparison I am currently reading Jasper Fforde’s Shades of Grey, which I am loving).
Books. Books, the meaning of it all. Books, which I shall go back and see next year if my able ladies are keen.
Next time I’m bringing two sleeping bags.
-S.
Sleeping bags are overrated. We (as in me and my loverboy) travel a lot in the summertime, almost every weekend. We gave up on sleeping bags in 2008 and saw the light: the thick goose-feathered double sheet/duvet/quilt (the English name escapes me right now, but I’m talking about the thing we sleep under (mind out of gutter please) and keeps us warm).
Anyway, that has saved us (mainly me) many times since the Icelandic summer night isn’t always very warm …
I love books too. I WILL go to the Edinburgh book festival someday. I absolutely will. Preferably as a published author as well. ;)
My only experience of Rob Brydon is from QI episodes on BBC Entertainment that we get out here – but I *love* his sense of humour. I would have flipped to have seen him in person – and also – HOW cool were those pod/tent thingys? Very Harry Potter at the world cup quidditch. :)
I am terribly jealous, i love Hey but have never been to the festival.
I am also a fan of Fforde but not read his new book yet.
Abs x
Your links don’t work on my iPod – you mean Robert (hero) winston … Right? Not ray, usually plays east end ganglord???
Festival sounds the business!!! X
Just read this on a laptop …. OM bloody G. All that and Uncle Bryn!!!
And you are so right about David Milliband – what is it with him?? He reminds me of the monster that they grew from OddBods finger in Carry On Screaming!!
I am ridiculously jealous of you. Hay-on-Wye! Argh! Also, I want one of those tents. Funnily enough, we got the reading copy of the new Jasper Fforde but it didn’t look appealing to any of us. Although, I do love my genre reading – maybe I should give it a go anyway. I was so deeply disappointed by Lev Grossman’s The Magicians, that I’ve almost told myself to ignore writers of fiction who dabble in genre…
And why did I never realize that Ray Winston was THAT Ray Winston???
@ Moira – sorry! Yes! Robert, not Ray! Urk – have corrected it now, lest I look like I’m talking about the Eastender-like gangster or the Ghostbusters character.
@ Orodemniades – stick out Shades of Grey – it’s hard in the beginning but very engrossing.
@ Johanna – Ooooh, there’s an Edinburgh book festival?
http://www.edbookfest.co.uk/
;)
OMG that sounds like so much fun. If that’s being a Dork, then I am a Dork and so is my husband. (Need to design built-ins for the thousands of books we have…)
On the sleeping cold— the worst times I’ve had are when I forget the rule Two below for every one above. You’re supposed to have two blankets under you and one on top— the two below you keep your body heat from leaching into the ground or the air mattress. It’s only unnecessary if you have a real mattress under you, and even then it’s worth considering.
sounds divine
Argh, you can see my neon blue coat of beauty!
A whole festival of books? I think I would swoon. Maybe I need to start campaigning for one here.
To express my own dorkiness, I ought to tell you that the first thing I thought when I saw the picture of the field of tent pods was, “Whoa, that’s just like the Quidditch World Cup.”
Yeah.
You should read “Hopscotch” by Julio Cortazar. I don’t know how to describe it except to say that the way he puts words together is stunning.
Serious jealousy over here. Of the festival, weekend out with friends, tents(even if it was freezing, it looks, well, others have made the Quidditch comparison already.)
As for the line jumper, always good to see we’re not the only ones with self righteous entitlementers (yeah, made that up) on this side of the pond.
A book festival? Oooooh. I’d die!
BTW, I love those lime green cushions. Very summery!
That took me right back to my student days, big leaky windows and no heating. I used to put on more clothing to go to bed in than I wore during the day. I always wore a wool hat to bed and thick wool socks. That’s a fine passion killing image isn’t it?
I am very jealous, not only because you went to Hay, which is my idea of heaven, but not B’s, but also because you went with fellow bloggers. Must actually meet some fellow bloggers in real life, I really must.
And ooh, a new Jasper Fforde? Must get. Although actually think he’s gone downhill slightly recently. Wasn’t convinced by the Nursery Crime series, or the last Thursday Next one either. Is this one any good?
Non-literate psychos are the reason I try to leave the house as little as possible.
This is now on my list of places to go.
Also, I loved The Knife of Never Letting Go. And the sequel. still have to get my hands on the 3rd one.
Patrick Ness is also pretty hot (and very engaging and articulate) in person. Just saying – if he’s ever doing a reading near you, go along…
I loved it, I love you girls, and why yes, I always look that yellow and smiley (thank you!).
Hugs.
I’m jealous…this sounds like heaven to me. And if you’re a dork, then I’m an even bigger dork–I went to Rhinebeck NY for a yarn and fiber festival. Does that trump your going to a book festival?
You were only an hour away from me at the festival. Now I am sad :(
But if you want to do it again and need warm beds with a steady supply of coffee and a mental kitty, gimme a shout :)
[...] even more fantabulous to go with friends, so I went with Ann and Shannon, who arranged it, bless her (why, yes, I am spectacularly gifted in the friend department, thank [...]
I am a giant dork, too.
I adore books.
Well, apart from textbooks :)
g