Every public speaker has had the same experience in the last twelve months: a rollercoaster ride of mass cancellations, sporadic take-up of tech solutions followed by a paradigm shift in delivery as demand for the popular group media rose as well as appetite for pre-recordings for individual and group download.

As tentative future bookings start to appear it feels like we might be reaching what Churchill oddly referred to as ‘the broad sunlit uplands’. Wading out of the treacle perhaps.

SAPPER CLAY TRILOGY

Last month it was interesting to talk again to Tunbridge Wells U3A, this time via Zoom, for the second part of the Sapper Clay trilogy – Staff Nurse Emily Connell’s Autograph Book – last time we’d met there was an audience of 100+ packing out the Camden Hall in Tunbridge Wells. Very positive feedback from the group and  very much a sense of a great group of people keeping things moving in spite of 2020. The third and final installment of the trilogy – The Doods Road Great Pigeon Loft (as unlikely as it sounds!) is being finalised and is available to book. It’s a story in itself so you won’t need to have heard the first two talks if you like the sound of it!

DOUBLE BOOKHAM

Another recent first was two back to back sessions on the same day for Life Learning in Bookham. This was an outing for my social media talk Have You Liked Me Yet? which is always fun as the content necessarily gets a full update every time I present with the ‘Socials’ world changing so quickly. Massive participation from the morning and afternoon groups in the Q&As with Trump’s departure, Vaccines and TikTok dominating discussions.

Zoom has become the norm for me and audiences but it feels good to look at a diary which now has a few provisional ‘physical’ bookings in it! Onwards and upwards!!