How I Spent My Lockdown 2 (Electric Avenue)

Before we kick off, just a quick caveat. This is purely a personal view of how I spent another month of being locked inside. It isn’t a “how to”, it isn’t a guide or recommendation. All it is is me saying what I did to get through November and how it worked for me.

Being honest, I didn't really go out that much between lockdowns anyway so it didn’t seem like a huge adjustment to me this time round. The virus was still out there and still infecting people in the in between bit and my preference was to err on the side of caution. I did, however, decide that I would try to fill November as full as possible of stuff so that I didn't notice the time going past. So here’s how I spent the month:-

• The last two sessions of my six week improv course (which I signed up for off the back of mucking around and taking part in online comedy shows)
• Virtually going to 22 talks as part of NextUp & Chortle’s Online Comedy Book Festival
• Also virtually going to about 10-12 other online comedy shows
• Doing a one day comedy masterclass with Spencer Jones 
• Still “going” to work (they pay me for that one, might as well)
• Created and ran two Zoom quiz evenings for mates
• Oh yeah, and writing a 51,500 word novel in 30 days as part of National Novel Writing Month (7th attempt, 2nd time "winning")

It worked. November absolutely flew past. I genuinely didn’t feel like it was that weird interminable neither quick nor slow spread of time that the first lockdown was. So, for me, the plan of making November as chock full of things as possible was an absolutely solid one and paid off. I imagine you may have questions about some of the above. Let me anticipate a few of them…

Improv classes and a comedy masterclass. You looking to become a comedian? (I’m imagining a note of incredulity in the voice for this one)

The improv is fun and is about playing, mucking around and having fun with a group of like-minded people. The comedy masterclass was because I’m fascinated by the process of how comedians craft their acts. Could it lead to something more? Maybe but nothing definite planned at the moment (beyond Level 2 of improv in January).

Book, eh? When can we read it?

In its current state, never. It’s a scrappy first draft of an idea I wasn’t overly invested in. The advice for NaNoWriMo is to always start a new idea and that was all I had to hand at the start of November. I’ll leave it for a bit as it’s still fresh in my mind and see what happens when I type it up. Maybe I’ll do something with it, maybe it’ll become parts for something else, maybe it’ll just be an exercise in writing for a month. Any of those things are still helpful. The important thing is that I was set a challenge to write something in 30 days running to at least 50,000 words with a beginning, middle and end and I did it.

Got your December planned out?

More online comedy. Increased levels of sitting around watching telly and films. Whatever festiveness can be had in the weirdness that has been 2020...