Day 2648
Wednesday January 28th 2026
Winchester
There’s a young white girl singer at the Buttercross and a slightly older and very loud black guy singing near M&S which means I can’t set up anywhere in the high street so it’ll have to be up at The Square, which is pretty well deserted.
A woman donates, I thank her and ask if she’s visiting (of course she is, because I know EVERYONE who lives here and I’ve never seen her before!)
‘I’m with my daughter, she’s auditioning at the cathedral.’
‘It’s cold, isn’t it?’ (It’s the usual 8/9 degrees)
‘Oh, I’m from Burnley so this is nothing!’
‘Actually, you’re right. My mother lives in Canada and it’s something like minus 18 degrees there.’
‘At least it’s not raining.’
‘Yeah I know. I mean I can play when it’s cold but not if it’s raining. No way!’
‘No…you haven’t got a marquee or anything.’
‘No, I’ve got to travel light, that’s my bike…’
There is no one sitting outside the restaurants and pubs apart from a middle-aged couple outside The Old Vine, with two pints. After Everybody Wants To Rule The World (which I didn’t play last time out), the man comes across, donates a pound and asks what it was I just played. After I tell him, he says ‘Yeah, sounds great…Blackbird by The Beatles?’
He’s in luck – ‘Right, yeah sure…I won’t sing it but I can play it!’ And so I do, and with minimal mistakes, which is better than maximum mistakes.
I did an hour and ten minutes – like yesterday, and the coinage was miles better…well, to the tune of £3.43 better, which is better than £3.43 less. So that was £7.58.
As I was walking the bike towards the really narrow alleyway, I said ‘Cheers, thanks a lot’ to the couple. They didn’t seem to hear me – maybe they were concentrating on their pints, so I said repeated it, much louder, and they then heard me and said ‘Yeah, thanks!’ in unison.