So me and a group of merry poets all took a trip up to Landed festival yesterday to put on a NTWTeam Word4Word event. It started by all getting on a very pimping mini bus and I mean pimping, leather seats, blue led’s and all that jazz. as you can imagine we were all feeling very nervous as us poets do before a gig but fortunately Mr Mark Dorey was hot on it and brought us all some shandy to calm our nerves (wild I know, sugar free, 0.5% shandy).

So after a few cups and a good old natter on the bus we had officially landed at landed festival, we were told the tent we would be performing in would be next to a giant unicorn, however I have never been lucky enough to see a real life unicorn so had no concept of scale. But we managed to find it none the less and it was a very cosy lovely tent. Though before I could get too familiar with it Anna Poole tempted me away with the promise of a sweet man with a husky voice and a guitar (by the look on her face I wondered if that was all he had but then realised it was probably just too much of the shandy).

She led the way and we followed till we came across a man with a keyboard playing the theme tune to Mario cart. Enthralled though I was this was no husky voiced guitarist, but then he picked up his guitar and started singing and restored all faith in Anna.

After this I split from the group and had a wander of my own, I came across too many lovely interesting people to mention them all and some great stalls my favourites included the creative recycling tent and the hog roast tent, a man who lived in France for the last 32 years and before that 20 years in a van and had some great stories and a man dressed as a storm trooper.

Then I bumped into some friends I hadn’t seen since last year, another great surprise. Their band was playing the next day and a few of our troop had dropped out so I told them they had a slot at our event.

I was having absolutely amazing time considering the festival didn’t look much to start off with (a beautiful location but not much there), We all had similar feelings but landed won all of us over...well all but our bus driver, i don’t think it was his cup of tea. But i thought i best get back to work and find the group to make sure all the guys were happy and to sort out any little bits they wanted me to say about them and their work.

I did feel a bit guilty abandoning them I thought they’re probably all stressed out wondering what the plan was. When I came across them they were all standing round having a great laugh all getting taught how to hula-hoop by a little girl and everyone was picking it up easily, well mark wasn’t to graceful when he attempted but again I suspected the shandy was more to blame than his hips.

Now this left me in a tricky position it looked like so much fun but I have never been able to hula-hoop. I had to give it one last shot, I had to know if I was a nonhula-hooper maybe it was in my dad’s genes, I’d never seen him hula, but if it wasn’t then it could be taught and if anyone could teach me it was clearly this little girl (she had mad skills). I picked it up thought about the timing, making lightning fast equations in my head about force, direction, wind speed, the curvature of the hoop, a bit of circumference and diameter was in there and at least 2 of Newton’s laws of motion.
To be honest I think I worked out the meaning of life inside that hoop but by the time I’d spun it round me and let go I had forgotten it all but somehow the hoop was staying up!!! How? I have no idea, but the feeling of being able to call myself a hula-hooper and the fun of doing it meant I no longer needed to work out the meaning of life. So maybe the meaning of life is to get into a position where you don’t need to know the meaning of life because you’re too busy enjoying it?

Anyway back to the festival I had a wander over to the tent and saw that the people performing before us were a few comedians all good mates of mine. I felt like the most popular man in the world at this point, Mates from all over the place seemed to be coming to this festival i had no idea existed.

But before I could watch and enjoy the show the girls dragged me to a Punjabi dancing workshop. To be honest we were all over it, we were immense, so immense that me and Anna started not only to dance but to sing we thought of a nice traditional Punjabi song to go with our dancing, we picked teenage dirt bag. Then so confident and completely free willed we as a collective decided to show our dance to the world outside then tent... twice. We were so good I don’t think the stall holders will ever feel quite the same way again.

After this I enjoyed the comedy then our show was on, it went almost as smooth as my hula-hooping/Punjabi dance skills I had newly acquired. Needless to say everyone nailed it from mark who opened for us despite being full of shandy and hog roast and envy of my hula skills to our guest band who came in and did a brilliant little set whilst I handed out kitkats to our audience, and then to finish off in the spirit of Team Word4Word we had a few open mic guests who all did amazing and finished the night of perfectly.

All there was left to do was have a quick beer by the fire and make the bus driver wait a little bit whilst we said our goodbyes to some old and new friends.

And as if we weren’t already grateful enough for such a fabulous day we were then treated to a reading of a brand new piece of work called “Dylan Thomas is a knob” which was generously dedicated to the fantastic Rosie Gleeson who inspired the piece.

I’d Just like to thank Maeve Scullion, Mark Dorey, Beth Grant, Rosie Gleeson, William Ford, Kerry Cad and Costello for performing so brilliantly and Anna Poole for organising it all and holding me together throughout the day and finally to NTWTeam for making it all happen so thanks guys