Sunday, October 09, 2005

National Poetry Day

It is a strange, but poetic, fact that National Poetry Day lasts about a week; leastways it lasts for about a week for me ( I am sure that it lasts for about six months for the organisers of this event over at the Villa de Poetry Society).

I was remarkably busy this year. I made visits to Denmead Prep and Ashfold School, and gave a 'Writing and the World Wide Web' talk at Nottingham City Library as part of Nottingham's 'Poetry in the City' Festival.

I particularly enjoyed my performance session at Ashfold School. Firstly, due the fact that I got to perform in a grand old room that was four hundred years old, and secondly because it provided a great opportunity to receive direct and positive feedback about my work. I also enjoyed the interesting questions posed by the participants in the world wide web session on saturday.

The week was not without its banana skins, of course. I managed to have a minor prang in my car on Thursday. On Saturday, the network security locked the participants out of the library's system ten minutes before the start of the session. Fortuately neither incident was very serious. I managed to break a rear indicator light in my tiny shunt and up in Nottingham the tech staffer worked a small miracle and got us all back on line in time for the start of the session.

I feel pleasently exhausted now that it is all over. I enjoy meeting new people face to face...but I was also enjoy my role behind the computer deep in the heart of trAce towers. I guess i am lucky that I get to perform both roles in my working life!