Yesterday evening I was waiting on Floral Street for Plácido's arrival.
I saw him approaching down the road, from the Bow Street and rushed over to greet him, just as the first drop of rain fell, rain that had been threatening all day.
A woman approached him and said that she was a friend of another singer (which, to be honest, I don't believe - more likely 'slight acquaintance' or 'met once at a Stage Door') and asked - or insisted - that she had her photo taken with him. At first she tried to do it herself by holding the camera herself at arm's length. As that, obviously, didn't work (cheap camera without a swivel screen), she thrust it in the hands of some other woman and ordered her to take a photo. The second woman, who didn't exactly come across as an archetypal geek, panicked "What button do I press? What do I look through". The camera owner pointed to a button but we weren't getting anywhere.
At this point, I felt as if everything entered a state of suspended animation. You know the cliché - you see your whole life flash in front of you: for me it was specifically every traffic jam I have ever been stuck in on a bus, plus all the French, Latin and Italian vocabulary I never bothered learning for O-Level (yeah, weird, but surreal suspended animation is like that, believe me).
No one who knows me, friend, colleague etc, would ever accuse me of being decisive or of taking control, but, sometimes when I'm in the wider world and people are dithering round, it dawns on me that if I don't take control, no one will, and we would be here all night. More raindrops were falling, Plácido was noticeably getting irritated, so I seized the camera and took the photo, before realising that I had therefore denied myself the opportunity of taking a decent one myself. I did manage to get this one, at the point he was briefly in conversation with an acquaintance.
I actually couldn't believe the woman who had claimed to be a friend of some other singer. she actually asked me if I would take another one for her. I got scowly and said 'no' in a rather truculent tone. I don't know who the hell she thought she was, though obviously some delusionist, but she was very rude and very bossy, and didn't even say thank you.
I also have to say I am always gob-smacked at people who demand an extended audience with Plácido, especially before a performance, when they ought to know better, that he doesn't like to talk before a performance, there are other people around, and, oh, it's just started to rain. Also, let's not kid ourselves - people in the public eye are really not that interested in the tedious boring detail of some dull tale being told. Of course the polite and/or PR savvy will listen politely, but that's out of politeness etc.
If I recall correctly, there was some mention on Floral Street of Spain winning the World Cup...!
