Beauty sleep in Nottingham

Cloudless skies over Nottingham when we arrive—a beautiful crisp, spring morning. Chilly as it was the temperature dropped noticeably entering the arena: another ice-rink, even colder than Belfast.

It should have been a perfect day to get out of the city along the River Trent on the Airnimal but I had not slept well on the bus last night. Something in the delicate balance of whisky and melatonin that usually sees me through until daylight must have been off. Or maybe it was just that I had been sleeping 12 to 14 hours a day when I was shaking off the voice destroying lurgy of last week and my sleep patterns were returning to normal.

Whatever. After breakfast I headed back to the bus for that most delicious of slumbers, the post breakfast nap. That nap extended into a full blown five hour sleep. I think this might be the first time in my life that I have spent the entire period between two of my three meals asleep. This is not the kind of thing likely to be recommended by GTD lifestyle gurus or Scandi probiotic gut consultants but fresh as a daisy out of my bunk I headed back to catering to assemble a wholesome Buddha Bowl.

The streets of Nottingham were looking their best bathed in a flattering late afternoon sunshine. I aimlessly wandered them until sound check. Thankfully, the ice rink had warmed up a bit by 7.15 pm when I joined my band of brothers on stage sporting a dapper new silk neck tie purchased that afternoon in one of the second-hand clothes shops that seem to be the only retail left solvent in Nottingham.

Not long after the first strains of Waterfront got people out of their seats it was all aboard the Phoenix for us—an evening drive tonight to take full advantage of our day off at the the seaside tomorrow. The chance to go to sleep in a bed in the same place you woke up in doesn't happen often on a tour.