Flowerpot's Moments of Fame Part Two

Mum rang at six o’clock last night.

‘In my paper it says something else is on at 7.30,’ she said. You could hear the panic bubbling down the phone. ‘Are you sure?’

‘Well, that’s what Dermot said and I guess he should know,’ I said. Thinking, well, there’s not much I can do about programme timings.

‘You will tape it, won’t you, so I can see it when I come down?’ bleated poor Mum.

I reassured her – Himself had spent some time making sure that the video would tape, and all went well up until 7.20 when I dashed next door to put the tape on.

It wouldn’t work. I hollered to Himself who grunted, abandoned the last of his meal and hurried down the corridor, saying, ‘Don’t be silly, Pop, it was working this afternoon.’

Ten minutes later, it still wasn’t working so I ran back to the snowy screened telly in the kitchen, shouting at Himself to come and watch.

He emerged, nearly in tears of rage and threw the remote onto the floor. It broke.
He was past caring.

‘****ing thing,’ he said – and other words in a similar vein.

Then we sat down and watched my fleeting glimpse of fame together.

I can’t tell you what a relief it was not to come over as some idiot who couldn’t string two words together. Then Mum rang for her debrief – she approved, saying, ‘you looked almost intelligent.’

Thanks, Mum.

Then my mate Deb rang to offer congratulations and Himself kissed me and said, ‘I’m so proud of you, Pop.’

By this time I was so excited I was running up and down the flat, saying ‘Mollie, Mollie, Mum’s famous!’

Mollie looked at me quizzically and jumped up and down as well, and after about half an hour, Himself said, ‘Careful, Pop. You’ll burst.’ And sent us out for a long walk.

I'm glad to say that a friend has taped it for me, so I can relive my moments of glory over and over and bore myself rigid (I won't inflict it on anyone else, never fear).

But The main reason I was so pleased was that the object of the programme was to vote for your favourite Westcountry author. The others on the panel voted for Thomas Hardy whereas I was torn between Daphne du Maurier and Mary Wesley.

I was glad to see that they opened the programme with my first soundbite on Mary Wesley and sex, (yes they did keep that bit!) and closed it with mine on Daphne du Maurier’s gift for writing. So I had my say.

Luvvies

Dermot rang last night – as of the TV series (see earlier blog on Flowerpot's forthcoming 4 minutes of fame). He spoke to Himself who said that I was walking our dog and instantly we have a connection (darlings). Dermot has a Jack Russell, too, though he won’t be bringing him to Falmouth for filming. Not another Chalkie then. I very nearly offered to dog sit but felt that could be asking for trouble – the cat would leave home at the very least.

He lives in Exeter (MissU are you listening?!) or at least was phoning from there, and is making a series of art based programmes. Having established that I was a) a writer and b) had worked in television, he was very chatty.

One of his programmes, he confided, is of a pub quiz in Dorset. He’s concerned about the level of alcohol they will have consumed by the time they start filming, so he’s promised them with as much as they like afterwards (paid for by him), provided they don’t have more than one drink beforehand.
Then there’s another programme with the WI. ‘You’re not a member of the WI, are you?’ he asked anxiously.
‘No,’ I replied. ‘Not my sort of thing at all. Brings to mind slow handclaps.’
He laughed then and said another programme was of painters in North Devon and he was looking forward to that as they were ‘semi professional, like yourself, so they should be easy to film.’

Not sure how I like being a semi professional, but better than being an amateur I suppose. After all, I'm a luvvy now, darling.