Has Anyone Been to Albert Hall?

I was planning to go to Manchester's newest club on Bank Holiday Sunday but tickets were in short supply. I couldn't place the venue when someone told me about it. It turns out I'd spent a fair amount of time there already.

Albert Hall, on Manchester's Peter Street, was the home of Manchester's Brannigans until the bar chain went into administration in 2011. I worked there for 3 months in 2003, when investors were already interested in refurbishing the upper area of the building- a dilapidated (and supposedly haunted) church.

Around this time one of the managers phoned me on a Saturday afternoon asking me if I could work a few extra hours. He mentioned that some investor types were interested in buying the upstairs of the building- the church itself- to renovate it and open it as a restaurant. Could I come in and give the place a bit of a tidy-up? Even though university deadlines were looming I- perhaps stupidly- agreed.

So he led me up the stairs into the abandoned church with a broom, a shovel and a stack of bin bags. For hours I swept and scooped and sweated. It was a bit freaky at first, but there was nothing to report. Certainly nothing like what Derek Acora claimed to find when he visited some weeks earlier for “Most Haunted”.

“Premier Nightspots!!!!” Even in 2003 that would have been HILARIOUS. Brannigans was a chav bar, through and through.

I never saw any paranormal shit there. A few girls who looked like Reagan from the Exorcist, but that's about it. I'd be curious to see how Albert Hall looks and feels these days.

But no, I didn't get there for Sasha Sunday over the bank holiday- I was SHATTERED.

Have You Used Poets & Writers Website?

Poets & Writers is a free online fiction and poetry resource. They describe themselves as “the nation's largest nonprofit organization serving creative writers.” If you've got a story or poem you want to get published, I believe this is a good place to start.

I'm going to have a trawl around the site this week to see how it works, and to see if I can find some potential homes for my newest poems.

Have you used P&W? What did you think of it?

What am I doing tonight? I don't even know.

Strange bank holiday weekend. Ups and downs. Fighting off insomnia without becoming hooked on Zopiclone: a balancing act.

Got free entry to Sankeys nightclub in Manchester last night. Found a deal online. I'd not been since '04, when I saw Arman Van Helden play. Last night's beats were courtesy resident DJ Krysko, whose name I've heard dropped on Radio 1.

When Manchester is largely dying on its arse from half a decade of recession, Sankeys is still packing out. Way over capacity, the club had no room to dance- not that many people wanted to do that anyway. Rather than being a down-and-dirty dance music club, the venue is now full of stillettoed dolly birds and pumped-up gym nuts who've probably never thrown a punch in their lives. And the line for the toilets was as long and as disparate as the queue for aid packages in Syria.

I'll stick with Warehouse Project and Albert Hall for club nights, the latter of which I was supposed to be going to tonight. That has fallen through though...

On a separate note, I've got back into combat sports this year. I'm training with Oldham Boxing Centre at Victoria House. I'm getting my cardio fitness back gradually, and my hand and head movement is sharpening with each session. The tuition is spot on.

It's when I use a weights gym that I notice the only downside: my actual strength has dropped a lot. I can't do anywhere near as many chin-ups or push anything like my bench press record. So I'll skip cardio at the weights gym from now on and focus on weights- all the cardio I'll need I'll get from boxing anyway.

So does anyone from Manchester want to go out right now? Hit me up...

Splits Month

I've just completed another project marrying exercise and literature. This time, I spent a month attempting the splits, whilst sitting and reading.

I was juggling another project at the time of this and didn't have the time I thought I would, but I still made steady improvement.

At the start of the month my feet were 1m 37cm apart from each other. By the end, they were 1m 50cm: a 13cm improvement. By measuring the inside of my legs- up one leg and down the other- I can work out that the distance apart my feet would be if I was doing the full splits is 1m 66cm.

By my estimation, getting that far would take just over another month, at my current pace. And my current pace hasn't been as fast as I'd hoped: as mentioned, I'd not spent as long sat in that position as I'd planned to. I'm tempted to give it another go just to see if I can get Van-Damme-level stretching. But with it being National Poetry Month I'm a little snowed under, and with summer around the corner I'll want to get out of the house and get my vit D as much as possible. Trying the splits outside when you live on a council estate in Oldham will result in the same treatment you'd get if you tried selling Al Qaeda terror training brochures from your car boot. (You'd get the crap beaten out of you.)

Advice if you're going to do this project:

1. Find a door frame that isn't at the joint of two walls. Keep the door open. I used the doorway from my lounge to my kitchen.
2. Keep a light on to illuminate the book.
3. Wear socks and soft, warm clothing.
4. Sit facing the door with your feet on the glossed skirting board. Butt-scoot in until you feel a slight strain at the top of the legs.
5. If you can, grip the door frame to stay upright and to edge your legs apart a little more. Be VERY careful with this. Don't pull a muscle. Also be sure the door isn't going to close on your fingers.
6. Stay in that position for a few minutes. When you've read a full chapter, test your flexibility. You'll soon notice a slight increase in stretching ability.

So what did I read? I was juggling two books.

Life's a Pitch: How to Sell Yourself and Your Brilliant Ideas

I picked up this Stephen Bayley / Roger Mavity joint venture in the Design Museum in Greenwich. When you want something, and someone else has it, you need to pitch them. It could be a potential romantic partner. It could be a raise in your job. You might have a great business idea that needs financial backing. This book tells you how to pitch. It's written with wit, charm, buckets of research and a few cocky, surprising revelations. I was a little confused as to the formatting, though. Quotes from the text were occasionally blown up to break up the text, like in a magazine. Isn't this done to keep the attention of the reader, who- when reading a magazine- might flip to another article? With a book, don't readers read in chronological order? So isn't this quoting unnecessary?

The content, though, was fascinating and the delivery brilliant.

Copywriting: Successful writing for design, advertising and marketing

Copywriter Mark Shaw's 2^nd edition of his guide to producing great copy is an interesting, vibrant insight into the copywriting business. Good informative writing sidles up next to replicated posters and website screenshots, with copy text reproduced alongside so you can clearly read the adverts. Well explained and presented. Most of the book covers advertising, but the final chapter delves into the online world- a good introduction to internet copywriting such as blogging and use of Twitter. The subject matter in this last section could really warrant a whole extra book, but that's a different issue.

The one missing answer in the book is to this question: how the hell do you get a job in copywriting? How do you get someone to PAY you to do this, now you know how to do it? No-one I have ever met could answer that question. Hence, I'm still a business support officer.

Practicing the splits will incur steady progress, but now I'm boxing twice a week that may still happen (as part of the cool-down we stretch off). I'll continue to occasionally test flexibility this way, but to focus on this for a full month I'd be better off trying again in autumn once it's cooled off.

Give it a shot yourself- let me know how it goes!

Manchester's Finest Returns to Entourage 2nd May

Possibly the best old skool house night running in Manchester at the moment is Manchester's Finest, a monthly retro night held in Entourage in The Printworks. I got handed this flyer after last week's awesome event. I've noticed that this design doesn't seem to be online at the moment, so here it is.

DJs include Stu Allen of Manchester's Key 103 fame and Pianoman, who remixed Blur's Boys and Girls with his '96 top ten hit Blurred.

Performing a live PA will be Sweet Female Attitude! You remember Flowers, from 2000, right?

DJs on rotation will also include Dave Booth, Adam Guy, Stef Xiros, Bini, Danny Woods and Andy Finn.

I'll be there. You be there.

Manchester's Finest in Entourage

Last night I hit Entourage nightclub in Manchester's Printworks for Manchester's Finest, a night of local-based house music.

Here's old skool DJ and former Key 103 presenter Stu Allen 

I used to listen to his shows like this one on Key 103 in about 1996, so it was great to see him finally play.

90s dance music icon Rozalla performed an impressive but short 2-song PA.

Apologies for being a short-arse and not being able to see my camera's viewfinder as I filmed over my head.

Also working the decks were John Fitz, Adam Guy, Nick Hussey, Lewis Barlow, Shaun Lever, Fash, Stef Xiros and residents Bini, Danny Woods and Andy Finn.

Brilliant music and atmosphere, if you'll excuse the odd stalker-ish weird woman staring at me from the other side of the dance floor all night. Hey, no night is perfect.

This appears to be a monthly night with the next event held on Friday 2^nd May. Performing will be garage act Sweet Female Attitude and Old Skool producer Pianoman. My plan is to be there.

Square Ring

Day 4's prompt over on the NaPoWriMo site is a lune. After spending a good portion of today watching 1980s Mike Tyson fights on Youtube, then doing some bagwork and sparring myself, I came up with...

Square Ring

Above the gloves

his eyes fixed, body bracing

fearing the blow.