Firstly and above all, apologies to those of you who wanted to come and say hello after the show. My few days off were beset by some non-porcine plague, in the way that bodies tend to sieze upon any quiet lull after an extended onslaught of sustained activity in order to punish the bearer severely for working so hard. I dragged myself to last night’s first night in Oxford, found I had to do an interview and photo-shoot for the Times, which I thought, like a ‘nana, was due to happen today, and was then amazed that the first half of the show went well and that I found a voice that seemed strong enough, given that I could barely speak a word during the day. In the second act it suffered, which is worrying: a few coughs and a dip in vocal energy may not matter much to that night’s audience, but without getting a chance to rest, the voice can just suddenly go, leaving us having to cancel a show or two as we did the other year. 

So I had to skip signing, under sensible instruction from my company manager. Standing out in the cold talking and chatting is lethal for a damaged, suffering throat, so I hope any of you who were there can understand. A note was left on the door – if any of you have left anything for me to sign, I’ll see to them today, and you can come and grab them later on today – any time after 7.30 –  from the stage door. I doubt very much that I’ll be signing tonight either, I’m sorry. If you have books or things – even programmes if you turn up early – that you can drop round to stage door before the show, I’ll sign them straight after and leave them there for you to collect. But I’ll be running straight off for Lemsip and beddy-byes right after the show, so forgive me if I don’t get to scribble my moniker on programmes and tickets bought too close to start time. 

Please – anyone leaving anything – remember to put a note in with your full name on! 

Now, to cheer us all up, here are some videos of some of the crew at the afore-slagged Novotel in Wolverhampton, when the hour was late and we were all rather tired. Firstly, dancing to ‘Woman in Love’ which playing quietly on the in-ceiling speaker system (so turn up your volumes please), is our own lovely Jennie:

and then, never to be outdone (although he clearly is), is our own ‘handsome’ Iain. One for the ladeez:

I note that Iain’s head looks too big for his body in this film. Rest assured this is his normal appearance, and not a perspectival glitch of the camera’s lens. Hope to be better for Grimsby x