So I was back in London from Canada for 36 hours - always a disconcerting experience facing that much unopened post - and I had a LOT to do. But then off again to Benicassim for the music festival, which I'd missed the start of. Missed the Santiago Calatrava stuff in Valencia in my rush to catch up with the debauchery going on at the festival, safe in the knowledge that I'd have a few days in Barca after to get some 'culture'.
It was a mess, a big, beautiful mess. The whole weekend was a writhing mass of gorgeous, honey coloured people, jumping around in the setting sun and then the steamy night to Leftfield, Boyz Noize, Daedalus, Dizzee Rascal, huge mdma grins on their faces, safe in the knowledge that next day would be spent stretched on the beach to recover.
And then it was over. Everyone left, and I had to go to Barcelona. Only I didn't. I had a cheap good room in the hotel, the food was good and it was a long trip on a hot day. So my friends jumped in taxis, trains, and staggered home, and I stayed... and read Crash by Ballard on a comedown. Very very strange. Barely spoke to anyone for 2 days as 'suicide tuesday' came and went and felt I was being sucked into the book, the feeling you get when you wake up from an intense dream and are not sure if its been real or not. A dream hangover. It started to feel that way about the weekend - I remembered it, but had no connections to it, unless I wandered up to the deserted site to prove to myself that this was where it had all been going on.
And now, after 15 hours of travel home, 2 trains, a metro, a bus and air traffic delays, home. Breakfast... and on the road again, to sit with my mum waiting for my dad to come out of heart surgery in hospital 300 miles away in Cornwall.
Tea and toast, with marmalade please.
