I am now chez Fringe – drove into a very foggy Edinburgh on Monday evening, via the very definition of ‘plenty of stops’ (as parents continue to advise). Here they are in all their glory:

- Left Guildford on Sunday afternoon
- Stopped in near Bedford to pick up a keyboard
- Stopped in Newark to do a gig at ‘New Wine’ festival. It went rather nicely.
- Drove onto Sheffield and stayed the night there, chez Days Inn. More bearable than I thought, for a roadside motel.
- Monday Breakfast near Leeds
- Stopped in Newcastle to see The Dark Knight, which was excellent, and I’m no comic book movie fan. Heath Ledger was great. Oscar for him, I reckon.
- Checked my email in a McDonald’s in Berwick-upon-Tweed. Bizarre that McD’s now do free wireless at some outlets – just didn’t seem right surrounded by kids, eating a Big Mac, firing up my laptop.
- Arrived in Edinburgh Monday night.

Found my accommodation – an odd room near South Bridge (which is quite central), where the kitchen and bathroom is all part of the one big bedroom. It’s very ‘studio’. A bit soulless to be honest, but I’m only here for a week, as to save money I’ve 3 different accommodations for a week each. I must enjoy the centralness of this while it lasts.

The city doesn’t seem ready for the festival yet. There are very few posters up, the Royal Mile contains only one street performer, I drove past my venue last week to try and drop off props but I didn’t even recognise it as a venue – it was just a street. Even walking down the street today, the amount of locals here is vastly more than I’m used to. I guess they’ll mostly be buggering off on their holidays at the end of the week, when it becomes unbearably artistic. What’s amusing at the moment are the coachloads of tourists who have clearly misjudged their visits – there are loads of them, all reading fringe guides, staring at the only street-performer they can find, piling into Buffet King to work out what to do now they’ve realised the festival doesn’t start till Thursday.

I haven't blogged in a week or so, as I've been busier than I can recall ever being. I've had an Edinburgh show to write, and a sitcom script to rewrite and send off, and a wedding to plan, and a house to buy. Four things that you should probably dedicate a good month to each, and I haven't allowed myself that luxury.

I'll just talk about Edinburgh here, cos the other things are all at least partly under wraps. And my, July can be a rollercoaster month. Two days ago I had a lovely preview show in Bedford. Then last night a not-so-lovely one in Brighton. So it's very tricky when I'm banking so much on each show - trying several new bits specifically that night - to judge what's working and what isn't.

Last night for instance was pitched as an Edinburgh preview show, and introduced as such by me, but being the middle of the party bit of Brighton at 6:30 on a Saturday night, we had a few groups there seeing this as the start of their big whoop-whoop night out, so a hen do and a too-cool-for-school birthday group were there. Not quite the forgiving arts-centrey audience that I probably could have done with. I'm ready for this cos the show is lots of me trying new things, so it's always going to be a gamble, and at some previews it's paid off. It largely worked last night, but with that sort of party-party crowd where only one person had the idea to come to the comedy and the rest followed dutifully, all it takes is one or two less polished bits and they lose their interest. To give them their credit, bless that lovely hen do for being nice throughout.

This year's show is introduced as being about me leaving my musical comfort zones - ie. stop listening to the stuff I normally do and try some styles I'm not normally into. But it's expanded to be about leaving comfort zones in a way I'd never intended: Somehow it now contains 3 songs, and I've never sung professionally on stage in my life, before Bedford two nights ago.

But I'm not sure the songs are working - a shame, having spent ages writing them and begging friends to record them as backing tracks. Hmm. Is it that they're not funny enough? Or that they're just a change of pace from my normal stand-up and the audience find it hard to adjust? Do I just need more confidence with the performance of them? Do they need cutting completely? Or trimming to a verse or two rather than six? Or a bit of choreography? It's at times like this I think I should have had a director. So I don't know. If anyone would like to give me direction on this without having even seen/heard the songs, feel free to just pick one of the questions above as being what you think I need to do with it. I am more than happy to take random direction from someone who hasn't even seen the show. Well it's cheaper than getting a real director...

Oh, and since my last blog with my big surreal to-do list, you'll be pleased to know I've ticked off all those things, apart from 'Buy a whistle'. That should be easy. Thought about getting on Ebay for one to save money, then I thought, "Second-hand whistles... Maybe some things are best bought new."

The odd things you end up needing this time of year. It's the same every July, as my over-ambitious plans for the Edinburgh show slowly get either trimmed back or scarily realised. So this week my jobs include:

- Find a 7yr old ginger boy, to play a young version of myself in a video
- Buy lots of packs of Cadbury's Fingers
- Find someone with a Mini-DV camcorder
- Try and fit into some leather trousers I last wore a decade ago
- Learn the ukulele
- Buy an "I am 3 today" badge/card
- Edit a medley of Christmas carols
- Buy a whistle
- Buy a suit that's about 1 or 2 sizes too big for me
- Invest in a fan that spells out words on it
- Rewrite the lyrics to Mack The Knife
- Write the lyrics for a spoof musical theatre song
- Research the history of rock music
- Watch Emmy-Lou Harris's Ten Commandments of Country Music, that I recorded last Christmas
- Email Roxette's manager

I have already this week bought two very cool hats. One is an alligator-skin (fake) cowboy style country music hat, and the other is a very comfortable trilby that I liked so much that I wore it all day at home on Monday, plus to the pub.

Some days I wish I was one of those comedians who just turns up to a stage and a microphone, talks for an hour, then goes home. Then I remember that that would mean I don't get to wear the hats...