Monsoon

Woke early today again, and had to prepare for the whole day out before driving over to collect A from her work car park so I could take her to the airport for her weekend trip to Barcelona with her friends.
After I’d dropped her I drove home and walked quickly round to Soderberg to meet CH for coffee and a cheeky cardamon bun along with a good catch up chat about sabbaticals, horse riding, tapered retirement, Valencia, big birthdays and films. Good to see her. I then went to see Hannah Lavery and Donald Smith talking to Amina Shah in the Spiegeltent at the book festival. A gentle hour, reflecting on the links between literature, poetry and the city of Edinburgh, and quite long readings from both their books. At one point Hannah had to stop her reading as the heavens opened and a very heavy shower battered down on us. At least we were inside, with only the sound drowned out!
Afterwards I bought a sandwich and soup at the EFI cafe, having just bumped into @LauraM briefly, and waited for my meeting with MR for his annual review. Not long before he was due to arrive I got an email from him saying he couldn’t come, so I decided to nip home during my spare hour. Have to admit to a brief nap again (can’t have this becoming a habit!) before back to EFI to meet up with @Munroist4113, her friend J and @LauraM. We chatted about festival events, holiday trips, children and grandchildren, and the work on EFI and then I took them on a wee tour of the place before Laura and I briefly popped into the Quebec showcase (which just turned out to be drinks, canapés and speeches) before walking over to Bruntsfield to meet MH for supper in Decanter. Luckily it was by now a lot brighter and so I’ve avoided getting wet all day. We had a tasty supper and they both enjoyed some orange wine whilst we chatted about among other things mirror splashbacks, house hunting, caring responsibilities, dogs in restaurants and work nonsense.
We walked over to the Churchill Theatre and CR met us to see The Outrun play. It was cleverly done given the very different locations in the book of the wild Orkney countryside and the chaos of London’s drink and drugs scene, and very moving. The main part was exhausting…the young woman playing it was never off the stage and wiped away her tears as she came to the curtain call….
Walked home and straight to bed.