An enjoyable evening, which could have gone either way - Storytellers Club followed by a BBC party thing. Storytellers Club intimidated me a little cos I'm most comfortable telling made-up jokes, but it was a lovely club, a lovely audience, and I made the most of it by telling a true story about a time I went to Holland to meet a young lady. Anyway, I stitched about 4 stories together, and I reckon I've got a few bits I can crowbar into this year's Edinburgh show, so I'm chuffed with that.

Then dropped in on the way home to a BBC launch do, plugging a new live night they're doing. And it was nice in that there were lots of people I knew there from different places - a guy from uni, comedians from the circuit, various producers I'd worked with on different things, some writers I holed up with for a week a couple of years ago, some actors I'd written something for once, a good three or four people I've know idea how I met...

And yet I felt that odd conflict over writer/comedian. Because...

Writers, some writers at least, seem to relish meeting up, because writing can be such a lonely job. So it can be nice to catch up, bond, gossip, moan, etc. But...

Comedians, some comedians at least, don't like networking or hobnobbing - it's a bit too 'industry' for comics, who seem to just stick to people they know.

I still can't decide which I'm more of, so given that I'm a 50/50 split of writer/comedian, I found myself last night relishing the chance to be there, and then finding I didn't want to network. Paul the writer really enjoyed himself; Paul the comedian was socially awkward from the minute he got there and kept trying to leave, until Paul the writer convinced him to stay. (I should say at this point that I haven't got a split personality, and neither have I.)

Save The Rhino gig at The Comedy Store last night. I think it was actually a gig for someone called Dave The Rhino, but they spelt it wrong. A fine bill it was, present company excluded - Adam Buxton, Tom Basden, Dan Clark, Jack Whitehall, Vicky Frango, John Fothergill, and headlining Noel Fielding from The Mighty Boosh. What was odd about seeing him there was the way it crossed from comedy to rock 'n' roll. The front two rows were full of teenage girls, who went all gooey whenever he happened to mention the words 'genitalia' or 'naked'. Noel backstage related how at the Boosh's gig at Brixton Academy, a TV exec noted the same thing, telling him it was akin to Beatlemania. Noel said to her, "Great - so does this mean I can make a programme with you?" "No," she replied. Fickle, telly.

Speaking of which, I notice on www.chortle.co.uk today the new BBC3 line-up is announced. They mention 5 new shows (Trexx 'n' Flipside, Scallywagga, The Wrong Door, The Wall, Coming of Age), and it's satisfying to know that I've been involved in writing, rewriting or script-editing 3 of those 5 (the 1st three listed above). Trexx 'n' Flipside is a sitcom about two rappers, Scallywagga is sketch show set in the north, and The Wrong Door (which will probably change its title) is a CGI-based sketch show. You can see why they asked me - I'm a hiphop expert, I'm from the north, and I'm partly computer-generated. Oh no that's right, I'm none of those things. Anyway, them three all have Kerensic jokes hidden in them somewhere. So if the new season on BBC3 is rubbish... well then don't blame me cos it was probably the actors mucking it up. If it's good though, then remember, you read it here first.

Bizarre day, when the only words you say to anyone all day are the 30 minutes you're on stage. I worked from home, writing, didn't speak to anyone on the phone, my housemates were out. I drove to Clacton-on-Sea - a long old way, did the gig, battling with a 43rd birthday most of it. Then drove home, got in, and just saw my housemate for about two minutes during which she told me how her day was, and when I started to tell her how my day was, she just went to bed. How frustrating. Grr to her.

So instead, dear blog-reader, I shall tell you how my day was. Except I won't, cos my wireless router thing isn't connecting to the internet, so I'll have to write it offline and post it tomorrow. Nice, this conversation lark. It's good to talk.

Well I won't tell you how my day was - I'll tell you instead how my yesternight was, for I went to the ballet for the first time. Twas the Royal Opera House doing The Nutcracker. And what an introduction to the artform it was. If you're going to do something, do it properly, I say. And they certainly did. Now I'm now ballet enthusiast, so the sum total of my review is really that they could all do the tip-toes thing, so 10/10 for that. One of them in particular, playing The Sugarplum Fairy, was very good, by which I mean very bendy and could do the splits on point, and could do lots of spinny things, many many times in a row, and she didn't fall over or wobble or anything. I was well impressed.

It was great to see something with a live orchestra, and equally great to see that the musicians all wore tuxes. Less impressive was that the bloke next to me was clearly some kind of autistic trainee conductor, cos all the through the entire two acts he was waving his arms around like he was swatting wasps, rocking his chair back and forward, humming bits, breathing loudly, laughing at bits that weren't funny (but were I'm sure were musically hilarious) and generally being very distracting in my eye-line. I, being English, said nothing. But boy did I want to lamp him one.

So, a refined evening out. Not my cup of tea, if I'm honest. Twas interesting to do, and I could admire the diligence of the dancers, the wonderful music and the amazing set, but for me I found it difficult to make all these things converge into a show. I didn't really follow the story (although that isn't really the point), and I found myself more looking at the orchestra than at the stage. But most importantly, Zoe enjoyed it, so job done there. It was part of her Christmas present. The other part was goldfish. And unlike the ballet, I could watch the goldfish for hours, without wanting to punch the person next to me for tapping his hand in time to their swimming.

There, I'm glad I got all this off my chest. Maybe tomorrow I'll have a conversation with someone. That would be nice. Call me. (Is that as sad as it sounds?)

I haven't blogged in a week. Partly because I've been too busy to blog, but also cos I haven't been doing anything interesting enough to blog about. Which makes me wonder what I've been so busy with.

Well over the last two days I was busy doing some ageing, and I was very successful at it - in fact I turned from being 28 to being 29 in just one day. Fascinating. Because I'm clinging to my 20s now, I thought I'd have a retrospective birthday this year. Which sounds artsy and arsey, but in fact means two things - 70s night and Laserquest. They were both great - I had every cocktail Flares offered, and I was middle-to-rubbish at Laserquest - but I do now have slightly aching limbs, as I have neither been clubbing nor run around a dark room shooting lasers in nearly a decade. I have decided that in my ongoing search for a form of exercise I actually enjoy, I might try and go to Laserquest more often, cos it's a goodish work-out (40min of running around keeping your wits about you - not too strenuous but we all broke a sweat).

I do now have another form of exercise open to me, as the young-hot-ball-and-chain bought me a bike for my birthday. What a fab pressie. She calls my old bike 'the boneshaker', cos it's 10 years old and made when bikes weighed a ton. You feel every bump in the road, and uphill is a struggle, for even the more seasoned of bike-riders. But no more. I now have a pretty darned swish up-to-date brand new bike. I spose I'd better ride it now. Equally I asked for some teach-yourself-guitar books for Christmas, which I duly received (thank you!), so of course now I have to go through with it, and actually learn guitar. Something I've wanted to do, but once you get the books as a present, you've got to really do it, haven't you? So tomorrow I shall be seen through the streets of Guildford, cycling while strumming a 6-string.

Our first 'proper' night at The Stoke pub comedy night, and I feel it was a veritable success. Sold out, plus a bit, so that's about 160 audients. I am knackered now - it takes a heck of a lot to run a gig, it seems. Much easier to just turn up, do 20min of jokes, and go home again. But it's worth it I reckon. We had Stuart Goldsmith, who was fab, and popular among the ladies, twould seem. Jenny Lockyer in the middle did some very sweet songs, and clearly went down well cos she sold all her CDs. Check out myspace page for some of her songs. They're the sort that are funny if you listen to the lyrics, but equally just nice to listen to. Aw.

And Tim Vine headlined - meant to do 20min, and he did well over an hour. So I had the dilemma of whether to flash a light at him to summon him off-stage, even though I wanted him to stay up there. So I did, but thankfully he ignored it. But he only ignored it cos I was shining my phone at him, which generally seems to be the modern way of luring an act off-stage. But of course Tim doesn't do the circuit much, so didn't know this. He expected an old-fashioned flash of the venue lights. Anyways, twas a fun one. I shall now sleep for a month, whereupon we'll do it all over again with some different acts.

And a quick plug - I'm on Radio 4 in half an hour, 6:30pm, on 28 Acts in 28 Minutes. I'm number 18. Also on it are Arthur Smith, Marcus Brigstocke, Jimmy Cricket, and 24 others. Or you can listen again on the Radio 4 website, if, as I presume, you read this blog at some other time than within half an hour of me posting it...