Pseudery

Lee and I were planning to go to Borley in the afternoon but after I’d signed on, sat in a café with Stu, and finally got down to Maynard Gardens, we both started to realise that we were being too unrealistic to expect to be able to hitch the 150 or so miles to Essex.

Lee has bought films for his two still cameras, the Ricoh KR-10 and the Pentax Spotmatic, plus a three-minute film for the Yashica ciné, and has a half side of ciné film left in the Chinon. We’re borrowing Ian’s stereo Walkman cassette recorder, and we’re bringing three blank C-90 cassettes. We still have to buy penlight batteries and candles, and have to retrieve the torch from Smith Square, which I hid as we were discovered by the cops. By the time Ian showed up having forgotten the Walkman, we decided to delay our trip until tomorrow morning.

Lee was helping out with a performance at the Art College at 1.30. I didn’t bother to go along, knowing too well the extent of the pseudery involved, and Lee said it all looked very amateurish and shamefaced, as though the performers knew how empty-headed and pretentious they were being. Performance art is a popular past time at the College and appears to be a thorough waste of time and effort, most of it seeming so jaded and predictable that it rarely stimulates or captures the imagination, or acts as a catalyst for further thought. It usually ends up with just an audience of bored fidgets.

Steve showed up again in the evening, down in Watermouth for the weekend. He has his visa for America, and apart from continuing concern over the ever plunging exchange rate, he’s all set to go at the end of August.

Lee and I plan to set off early tomorrow morning. Pete believes there will be hundreds of like-minded people in Borley this weekend. I hope not, and I hope the event doesn’t turn out to be a complete fiasco and waste of time.