I’ve been a right culture vulture, with two trips to the theatre in one week. First up was a ballet. Matthew Bourne’s Romeo & Juliet at the Alhambra in Bradford. I’ll be honest, I’m not a fan of Shakespeare but when it’s danced instead of spoken I get the drift much quicker. This modern interpretation was set in a young offender’s unit with most of the dancers wearing bright white to match the stark walls. When the lovebirds were thrashing around with knife wounds at the end, it looked like Jackson Pollock had been paintballing. I didn’t know who I felt more sorry for - Romeo, Juliet or the costume team tasked with boil washing the outfits night after night. 

A couple of things momentarily distracted me from the plot though. I’d had some really salty sausages for tea so was parched during the first half, even though I’d downed a pint of lime juice in the stalls bar beforehand. I’d also had to resist the urge to reach for my ankles every two minutes due to phantom itching. Yes, the felines kindly introduced some fleas into our home recently. It wasn’t an infestation, but to be belt-and-braces I booked Graham the pest control man, who rocked up in the full Ghostbusters garb.  

There’s not a nook or cranny in our house that escaped his pump-action poison gun. But I was most reassured when he told me that he hadn’t actually spotted one flea, dead or alive, in any of our rooms. The stories he shared about creepy crawlies and vermin in other places though were worth his fee alone. He said one guy ended up in hospital after a bird tick burrowed into his leg. I’m still gipping just thinking about it. 

It’s not the first time I’ve experienced fleas. When I was 18 and flailing my way through a BTEC in Drama, I shared a house in Knaresborough with fellow student Mandy and her louse-laden cats, Othello and Bottom. The bugs in her bed were out of control. We could literally see them cavorting on her candlewick spread. If I’d known then what I know now, I wouldn’t have bothered trying to catch and release them using a glass and beermat. I probably wouldn’t have attempted to batter them to death with a Brecht script either. But I would definitely have still rung dad to ask him for a lift home. 

My second theatre expedition of the week was to Bingley Arts Centre to see Redcoats, written by Nick Ahad. It was a laugh-out-loud yomp through the history of Butlins holiday camps, performed by the Mikron Theatre Company. Even my friend Shaz, who “doesn’t do plays with songs in” thought it was funny. I’d also been savvy enough to avoid the snorkers this time, so enjoyed a Jacob’s Creek instead of a juice at the interval. And thanks to Graham’s thorough going over with his gnat catcher, I didn’t need to claw at my calves for burrowing ticks once.