Tripe

If you are hard up in West Yorkshire, head over to Dewsbury. I had a couple of hours to kill there last week and saw a barber's advertising haircuts for three pounds. Inside, a notice said that they refuse to cut any hair which has too much gel, is greasy, or which hosts head lice. Dewsbury's also got a proper market selling big knickers with elasticated fronts, spanners, and tripe. The tripe stall advertises "50p mixed bags: dog bits, cat bits, husband bits!"

I got to Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival by the skin of my teeth, dragging together at the last moment a few pounds and a couple of places to stay. After train fares, my budget was about 4 pounds per day. On Wednesday, with the festival starting on Friday, I had nowhere to stay, my intended host letting me down ("I'm sorry looby, I've got to go to Poland.") I rang Kim, she of the ill-advised kiss lunge on Platform 14 at Leeds after our one and only date,  asking rather diffidently if I could stay with her for a couple of days, thinking that it was a request too far. Seeing as we don't really click in any way, she's been good to me: it was in her house that I finished my MA at 4.40am on the day it was due in, and she agreed to put me up for the weekend until my other billet was ready.

Being hard up at the festival was difficult at times: trying to dodge train fares and having to exit our stewards' party after one drink saying I was tired wasn't much fun, and in a moment of madness in Wetherspoons I saw an abandoned pint, stole it, then had a man march up to me asking me what I was playing at. I really did think there would be violence. But I gave him two pounds for another and went and sat down. He brought me the penny change.

There was a flicker of erotic interest (just a flicker) as I got talking on Day Two to a flame-haired hippyish woman. We met the day after and decided we both fancied the singer in a concert we'd just seen. Over the week we swapped relationship disaster stories and email addresses. I told her that I was at HCMF to do some participant observation for my PhD and that I was off to the pub to write my notes up. "Do I figure in them?" she asked. "Prominently," I said. Unfortunately there just wasn't quite enough spark to conclude the festival friskily.

I met Radio Kootwijk Live, giddy and wired after a successful performance. They invited me to sit with them and refused to let me buy any drinks. As her tea arrived, a Dutch woman turned to me and said "What's this?" "A Yorkshire pudding," I said. "Oh. What do I do with it?"

I accidentally knocked a bottle of official HCMF wine into my bag one night. I borrowed a glass, and took it into a John Cage concert. My second supervisor was there so I sat with him. "Your night off then?" he said, cocking his head towards the bottle I thought I'd concealed.

I got home and went to see my girls, bringing my meagre presents of a mini box of Ritter Sport chocolate each. I don't know how my haircut looked, but Melanie asked "Was it a violent festival?"