Rain Stopped Play

Firstly I have to fess up that I borrowed the heading for this post from one of Louise's emails!

The salad is made, the rucksack is packed, the pop up tent is, well, just sitting in the hallway in a no doubt highly coiled state, the car battery is charged (after a visit from Greengflag and 40 minutes aimless driving around Camberwell and Dulwich) and we are ready for some culture!

We pick up Louise on the way to Dulwich village - at least I believe the apparition in bright orange waterproof gear is Louise! She emerges from her house with the words "Not looking bad is it?" as she peers up at the steely grey sky. At this point you have to remember that Louise originates from Aberdeen and spends a good deal of her time in the Arctic. She is also undertaking an Open University Course on understanding the weather and so is able to assure us that the 3 hour forecast from the Met Office is not looking too bad.

We drive to the Crown and Geyhound in Dulwich Village where we are soon joined by Lucy who has come on her bicycle with a golf umbrella somehow attached. She also is in full wet weather gear. After a swift pint, during which I only just manage to avoid a major faux pas by enquiring whether Lucy has a bread maker (she was in fact up at 6am hand making the bread!), we head off to the park.

It is by now around 7pm although the level of light would lead you to believe it was later - maybe November. We find the "stage" (really just a platform with some steel poles from which electrical cables are swagged with a series of lightbulbs attached). If you are having difficulty envisaging this, find a 10 year old and ask them to "draw something that would be really dangerous in a thunder storm".

Unperturbed, we settle ourselves down on some rugs and set out the food. The salad is well received and Lucy's bread is just fantastic - banish all thoughts of breadmakers. She has made granary rolls which are glazed with some poppy seeds. With these she has brought some lovely Stilton and Cheddar cheeses to which I add some Gorwedd Caerphilly that I had bought a week or so ago but not got round to using. Lucy has also brought some home grown radishes which are great with the hummus from the salad.

By now the play has started - as has a light drizzle. There are probably about 40 people in the audience and they all look like they are used to this outdoor entertainment lark. Not a tent in sight however but there looks to be plenty of room to pitch one should the need arise.

Within 15 minutes the need certainly arises and Bren unleashes the beast that is the pop up tent. I have to say it certainly does what it says on the tin and within seconds there is a dry haven erected at the back of the, now thinning out, audience.

We all crawl into the tent which meant we are now dry - yay. We have however failed to realise that heavy rain falling on a tent makes quite a din so, whilst we are dry and (at least three of us) can vaguely make out the actors through the downpour, we can hardly hear a word. 10 minutes later the second clap of thunder and flash of lightning leads to the performance being abandoned.

My worst fears on the popping down of the pop up tent are realised and any advantage it has afforded in keeping us dry is wiped out by the drenching we get trying to get the thing down. In the end we crumple it up as best we can, ram it into the boot and slam the boot down before it can escape. It is currently still fully erect and drying off in a spare bedroom at home!

Having packed things away we head back to Louise's for a delicious fruit salad of strawberry, nectarine and passion fruit with meringues and whipped cream. Louise is now trying to drum up support for a second visit to the play later in the week (heavy rain forecast all week). I find myself unable to attend for various reasons - not the least of which is the need to pop down a tent.

The Menu

The tickets have been ordered for the outdoor performance of "A Winter's Tale" and thoughts have now turned to the food (and the weather). Louise has managed to rope in Lucy to join us for the evening. Lucy is a sculptor and landscape gardener and has agreed to bring some Neal's Yard cheeses and home made bread to the event. Louise has gone for the pudding option and is promising fruit salad, meringues and cream and I am going to make a salad of pink lamb, peppers and cucumber (Lebanese cucumbers if I can work out what exactly they are and where to get hold of them in Camberwell) to be served with Turkish bread and hummus. A perfect menu for a balmy summer's evening. This is the good news.

The bad news is that the BBC weather site has now come to its senses and has changed its "light drizzle at worst" forecast to "Thundery Showers" for Sunday 31 August. I do not have the heart to enquire of the Globe theatre whether thundery showers constitute the extreme weather conditions in the face of which performances will not go ahead. Instead I resolve to buy a pop up tent even though I am not at all sure I can bring myself to overcome the embarrassment of erecting the thing should the need arise. I am also slightly un-nerved by the fact that there is no mention in the product description of the tent "popping down".I do however feel that the tent, combined with the rucksack picnic hamper that I have had for some time but never used, will give us the edge over other theatre goers should things turn ugly!