Woodford
Saturday, 13th October 2007Posted under: struggles ,
Woodford, what a great festival, despite the stifling heat of the summer, the heavy thick rain. Woodford is an experience worth throwing yourself into. It is huge, which on one level can be a little daunting, my little Dome in this endless bonanza of music, dance, poetry, film, writing, singing, acrobats, you name it, it pretty much happens at Woodford.
So after a madly insane dash up to Brisbane, leaving a battle field of traumatised drivers and insurance claims in a sprawled wake behind us, we arrive at the promised land. It was raining.........
.........had been for ages, heavy thick relentless rain. My van hadn't been this clean since I bought it. I had wanted a sofa in my Dome, so I studiously researched where the nearest recycling depo to Woodford was so I could pick up an unloved sofa. And blessed be, there was a depo about 15 minutes away from the festival. But it was closed, despite assurances on their website. And it was raining. Heavily.
But I wanted a bloody sofa. So at the drop off zone we discovered a very large skip with lots of rubbish, perched on top of which was, glory be, a sofa. It was raining. The sofa was wet.
But hey, an opportunity not taken is an opportunity lost. So we annexed that wet baby and strapped her down to my bulging trailer.
We arrived at the festival sight with my heavy load straddled unceremoniously by a trussed, wet, used, sofa. "PrioritySpace?" yeah that's me. Very clean van though.
A few hours after deciphering the hieroglyphic directions to my site and digging the van out of a quagmire, we rolled onto the flat green little grass patch that would be my lair for the next week. Very square, flat despite being on a gentle hill, well drained, lush with growth, my own little meadow.
And as if it were a sign, the rain stopped falling and the sun punched a few holes in the clouds......... and screamed...... "GET THAT FUCKING TENT UP NOW!!!!!!.......".
Being wise and humble enough to know my place in things I obeyed this grand invitation to haste, my Dome and all its innards popped up as if an enormous kernel of popcorn had exploded.
Now my very good friend who so very unselfishly agreed to assist me on this little adventure, had in a rare moment of almost mystic clarity, suggested hiring some portable air conditioners to run in the dome. A stinking hot Dome, baking from the heat off a spiders web of electrical equipment, the accumulated contribution of a constantly replenishing source of hot sweaty bodies, a wet sofa and lots of very good insulation........ inspired images of a visciously unsubtle form of sick torture.
Now my good friend decided to contribute his engineering genius and skillful research to this problem by working out that the combined heat output of about 25 people, plus equipment, expressed in BTU's (British Thermal Units, one of the few measurements the British didn't concede to the French) could be handled by two condensing air conditioners. The idea of a wet sofa in those conditions actually terrified me. I imagined some vexing mold spore to evolve from that fetid and toxic concoction and, if not wipe out humanity, at least knock off a few of the public.... All my dreams, schemes, plans for an epic conquest of global proportions, slain by a virulent sofa ....
So in a wildly optimistic attempt to ignore this issue, I decided to invest in a barrage of drop sheets (used for painting indoors), and mercilessly wrap that sofa in great psychopathic sheets of choking plastic. Further covered the sofa with large drapes of spare black lining........ and wait, in hope, the public none the wiser they were reclining, ever so comfortably, on a violently asphyxiating lounge.
The festival started. "How much to go in?" the first question of the festival. "How much to go in?" the second question of the festival..... and third.... after many similar enquiries it became apparent people thought I was a stall of sorts. Perhaps selling some dark titillating thrill. I should have ridden this wave, teased the curious public with enigmatic hints designed to provoke their own salacious imaginations, then part them with their money as they seek to satisfy their voyeuristic urges by entering my little deception. But I declined the temptation of untold wealth, and instead employed the creative talents of two 12 year old girls to draw some "FREE" signs for me.
And the crowds grew, and the people started to ask questions about my work. And the response was just fantastic. I would have 5 people standing around waiting for one session to finish, and the moment people started to disgorge from my bubble, a great crowd of punters dissolve out of the crowd and jostle to find a place in the queue. I estimated between 5000 and 6000 people came through my Dome. It only holds around 20, max 25 people a session. I was very happy. It was very successful.
Which is probably why that sycophantic bastard friend of mine tried to poison me with off yoghurt. For simplicity, and security, we slept in the Dome at the end of the night. Now that I was out of commission for a whole day and evening, with a dome on a repetitive wash cycle for the masses, I was left, like some pathetic, groveling, vomiting worm, to endure my ordeal alone, on a nearby hill, somewhere in the festival.
But what doesn't kill you makes you stronger, Nietzsche was a con man.
The festival ended. I had few opportunities to experience it. But I was happy, everything had gone well, very well. But there was one thing left to do. Dismantle, then exhume the sofa. We decided to pack as much away as we could, before we released the hell that had been brewing in our make shift plastic sarcophagus. It was one of those moments, it had the tension of an Australian Idol winner announcement, or a big brother eviction.....
Peeling away the plastic..... great forests of green and mottled white, stretching like a fuzzy carpet sprouting with evil intent from the innards of this tomb, as if stretching for warm flesh, smelling it, seeking it........ well that didn't happen. In fact it was surprisingly dry, my theory being that the constant condensation of the moisture inside the Dome by these air conditioners accelerated the evaporation of the water in the sofa....... that's my story anyway, and my mate will corroborate it..........
On the way home from the festival we returned the sofa, drier than we took it..... it had been well loved by the punters....