John Hegley

Went into Manchester with Hazel this morning to see and hear John Hegley the poet talk (sing - recite ) to her 1st year group. First we had some breakfast in the canteen and then I wandered over to a collectors shop near Piccadilly Station in a basement. Hazel had bough Archie an old 80's Beezer comic there last time but I couldnt find any more comics. Lots of stuff but mostly expensive. Postcards, records, CD's DVD's etc.. I should have taken a photo as it was a bit like an Alladin's cave but I was the only one in there and the owner was giving me the evil eye for some reason. Maybe he thought I was going to steal his Beezers?
Anyway, so then I tried to find some other shops but they were all closed. The Art Gallery opend at 10 so had to wander around until it opened. Went to see the cabinet that Hazel and Sharon had put togther for the Mary Gregg project. It looked great. Also the Ron Mueck? very lifelike sculptures in the big new exhibition space.

When i got back to the room where John was to do his talk he was there already shuffling through a big wedge of typed papers and drawings. Hazel had gone to get a seebackroscope from the technicians dusty cupboard. It was the dustiest seebackroscope I'd ever seen! John looked rather scornfully at the dusty relic but said it would do. He projected a drawing of tow birds looking at a picture of a dark egg ( or was it a hole?) and was that a sandwich on top of the frame?
John played three songs on his mandolin called Kevin and a few poems but mostly just talked about being creative. Hazel seemed pleased that he said all the right things anyway and the students seemed to enjoy it.
We went for a curry for lunch as thats what John fancied. The chap who is doing the "object" book project from 3-D came along too and infact gave us a lift in his car to the "curry mile" down by the university. We ordered far too much for a light lunch but it was very tasty. Hazel only ate half of hers and I left a bit of mine- a vege biryani with poppadums and dips.
John and Hazel went back to see some animations that some students had done to illustrate one of his poems and I walked to the station and home. I was feeling knackered by this time and only done hald a day - no wonder Hazel feels done in by the time she ges home at 6:30pm.
John told me about CLOD magazine which he reccomended as "your sort of thing" so I found the webiste and ordered the latest copy.