I had been worried about today's gig for quite some time. I have also been worrying about DIY in my house. The DIY is easy to explain - the house should have been done long-since. The worry about the gig will take a bit more explanation.

Basically, I rang up asking someone for a gig a few days ago. Discussing what he was looking for, I then suggested that he shouldn't book me for that spot and should, instead, maybe consider me for support slots in future. Then my "agent" rang him and got me booked in for the spot I thought I'd talked my way out of.

Now, surely you want a good spot? Well, yes... but... I would consider it disrespectful to blag my way up a bill beyond better and more experienced acts. It's disrespectful to the other guys who are better and more established. It's disrespectful to the promoter to suggest I'm better than I am, and it's likely to go wrong if the audience see that the final act isn't as good as those that preceeded him.

I've worried about these things for a few days. However, if you go on stage with the wrong attitude, you're guaranteed to fail. So, I decided to do today for myself. I put 4 hours into the house before leaving for Huddersfield where I was to play this gig. I put the second coat of paint on my upstairs two rooms. Progress. Whoop.

I was due to stay at my friend's house in Leeds after the gig, so I headed up North with a plan for the next few hours. I had a new CD - the soundtrack of Xanadu - and this amused me greatly. In fact, when the Electric Light Orchestra kicked in with the song "Alive", I couldn't wipe the grin from my face.

I went to Huddersfield and I got ready for my gig. I made some backstage comment or other about how I felt a little over-sold for my spot and then concentrated on being as good as I could for the room I was given.

I didn't die on stage. I had some moments of hilarity. I had to use a lot of compereing skills to keep the room under control and I found that my songs turned the audience off where banter and spoken material really worked better. I kept my cool, did a fairly long set, took the money and got out of the town.

On the way out, I bought some beers, which I then consumed with the lads in Leeds long into the night.

Some of what I'd done today had been a bit of a challenge, some of it I was proud of. I certainly grew as a performer today and also got my house another step forward.