Day 2689
Saturday May 9th 2026
Winchester
Loads of people eating and drinking outside the restaurants and bars in The Square and it goes well for awhile…then a young woman comes up – I thought you should know there’s a parade coming through here soon so you might want to move over a bit. It’s the Pride march.’
‘Right, OK. So when’s that?’
‘They should be coming through here around 2.’
‘OK, so how long does that go on for?’
‘Well, it’s an hour but probably 15 minutes here.’
‘Right, OK, cheers.’ So I’ve got around 25 minutes until then.
I get a few compliments about the 12-string, which is always appreciated…one takes an amusing turn. A young couple come up and he says ‘Really like the 12-string. I play a 6-string but I’ve always wanted to get one.’
‘Well, I’m used to them. Actually, I haven’t had this one very long. I got it off my friend in Cheltenham.’
‘Really, that’s amazing. WE’RE from Cheltenham!’
‘Are you?’ I laugh. ‘Do you know Rebsie Fairholm? That’s who I got it from.’
‘Umm…Yeah, he does some open-mics there.’
‘Um…no, Rebsie’s a she.’
‘Oh right, no then. There’s this bloke whose nickname is Rebsie.’
‘Right, OK. Anyway, she was going to sell it through a music shop there and I didn’t want her to do that so I bought it off her. Cost me loads, actually, and I want it to pay for itself, which it is!’
Anyway, this is James and girlfriend Abby and they’re both very nice and James says he’s got some app thing that he can share with everyone in the area, so if he takes a photo of me, he can share it and anyone who wants to see/hear me can find me. I ask if he can put a short clip of me playing up. Of course he can, so he films me doing a verse of La Vie En Rose and puts that up – ‘So now, everyone can see that and come and see you because the location’s on it.’
At a few minutes to 2 o’clock I pack up and retire to the cathedral grounds and sure enough, the march is on time…and Jacob’s near the front, dressed in one of his busking outfits. He waves to me. I watch a bit of it then count the coinage – £19 for 50 minutes which is fine, then go down to the toilets after leaving my stuff with Dave the flowerseller, because I don’t want to carry the heavy case, and the suitcase up the steps and into the loo. Back out and to Sainsbury’s for a bottle of sparkling fruit flavoured water then back up to The Square, by which time the march has been and gone.
Set up again and start playing to the 2nd house (well, there ARE a lot of new faces)…and after almost an hour I’ve got only £1! Hummph, I might as well pack up…and then I sell two CDs and gain a fiver in the space of five minutes, which is how it is, sometimes. You wait ages for a bus, etc.. So I hang on and do another 40 minutes bringing the total to 2 1/2 hours, so the amp can do at least 4 1/2 hours on one charge (I didn’t charge it up after yesterday’s session).
Neat the end I got a text from home asking me to get a cauliflower…so after packing up, I went to the high street Tesco Express and because it’s small, asked the security bloke on the door if they have any cauliflowers –
Security bloke – ‘Ah…umm…I think…yes, those?’ he says, pointing to the flower stand.
Me – ‘No, those are flowers. I mean cauliflowers.’
‘Flowers? Yes’ and again points to the flowers.
‘No, those are flowers, I mean cauliflower. CAULIflower. It’s a vegetable.’
‘No…I think…I don’t know.’
‘OK, cheers mate’ and I go down the aisle, find they do have cauliflowers, get one, carry it between my arm and body with my guitar case-holding arm and to the till, passing the security bloke – ‘THIS is a cauliflower, see? So now you know what they are and that you sell them!’
I pay for it, put it in a Tesco bag and secure the bag to my extended (or telescopic, if you will) suitcase handle and I’m out and going home, uphill all the way, loaded down even more than usual with a sodding cauliflower.
Coinage was good – £46.02.