Day one of flyering. I have quickly remembered how much of a facist I am about who does and doesn't receive flyers from me. I'm sure the idea is
to get bums on seats, and tickets bought, but here are a list of the people I will not give a flyer to:

Anyone with children - I am not a child hater, but our show is not for them or their parents. Or their parents friends.

Anyone who doesn't speak English - They wont understand the show. And I'm racist. No I'm not, but there is nothing worse than a crowd who doesnt
understand your show because they don't know the language. Except maybe a crowd who doesn't understand the show who do speak English. Or perhaps
a crowd of people who throw axes at you because they think you're racist.

Anyone really really old - Cant have people dying during the show. Or sleeping. But mostly dying.

Anyone who looks like they might punch me if I flyer them - Sometimes I risk it in the hope that it will brighten up their day. Other times, like today, I
realise they have arms wider then my head/ scary scary scars/ blood stains on their tshirt/ half a live bat in their mouth and I just know to steer clear of them

Anyone who has a company pass - You're safe. For now.

Anyone who is actually from Edinburgh - They hate us, they really really do. We've arrived in the city and made it a mess. We deserve the hate.

So if you are any of the above then well done, I will leave you alone. Otherwise I apologise for the shamless self whoring I will be doing from now till
the end of fringeness.

Other interesting points of today:

There is a puddle on Cowgate that you should not stand by. Today I did, wondering why there was such a large puddle in the road and how that would
probably cause a soaking. Curiosity as they say, soaked the Douieb. Not once, but twice. Luckily, some passers by saw it and laughed so much they took a flyer and
will now come to the show. Tragedy = comedy.

Saw the Real Daniel O'Donnell show tonight at the Pleasance. Damn good show and the best intro line I've heard in a while. Go see.

Tomorrow the shows begin and I have four to do in one day. I'm sure that while booking them all in it seemed like a great idea, however now it seems like it will be a day of hell. I may well die before week one is over.....

Hey kids, do you want to lose all faith in your show before you start its run at the festival? Then why not try doing a tech run? You may have all the
confidence in the world about your month at the fringe, but sure enough the four hours you spend trying to make all the lights and sound work
alongside the funny is a guaranteed way to knock you down a peg or five.

Its a common symptom and runs along with the theatre's code of a crap dress rehearsal meaning a great first show. Theatre sayings are an odd thing, and have so far
never worked for me. Not mentioning the Scottish play is easy unless you are in Macbeth in which case its damn near impossible. Not wishing someone
good luck before a show is fine to do, if you want everyone to think you are a cold hearted non-caring shit. OK, those are only two, but I'm sure the others are lies too.

Today's tech gave us problems that were all mistakes from before we made it to the fringe. One of our sound clips wasn't mixed properly and now sounds
toss. According to the massively geeky tech man it was to do with gain, or girth or something beginning with g. To be honest his chat was so dull and nerd-
tastic that it could have been goiter or gorilla. I truly did not want to know. A geek tech is usually a good thing, because you know that those years of solitary
confinement and Star Trek will mean they have a better grasp of a lighting and sound board than anyone that has friends.

All in all though, it wasn't too bad. All the problems can be fixed by Thursday if we are really organised. List of things includes buying a beard, some elastic,
a cake, sorting sound clips and carrying a lifelike silicon stillborn baby to the venue. Quite how a stillborn can look lifelike I'm not sure, but the horror of such
a prop negates the need to think such things.

Other highlight of today - I almost bought a book, but I didn't. I did buy a plastic ninja sword. I think intellectually I made the right decision.

One guest spot to do tomorrow and the soullessness of flyering begins! Roll on the fringe!

If the above phrase is true then I am truly in for the worst Edinburgh festival known to humankind. Luckily today has already been a damn sight better
but yesterday truly made the term 'Road to Hell' eat its own face and cry about life in front of its friends at someone else's party.

Usually I rave about trains. As someone who spends far too much of life sitting in traffic on motorways wishing I had a monster truck or a gadget car
that has extendo-wheels, trains are normally those few hours of solace where I can sit comfortably, letting someone else do the driving while I watch
sheep happily regurgitating in a field outside the window. Yesterday though, National Express ruined a large portion of my life that I will never get
back to the extent where I would happily pollute the earth tirelessly if I can ensure I will never endure such utter despair. After queueing (yes queuing
for a train. The world is wrong) for 30 minutes, we were told 2 mins before boarding that the train was cancelled. What then followed was the closest
people have been to animals as train punter fought train punter for space on the following three trains as backlogs of passengers decided it was almost
worth losing limbs just to get to their destination as early as possible.

In the end we (the Tea and Cake posse) shared 3 seats between four in first class. Due to lack of space to rehearse lines we instead resorted to banter and
doing puzzles in the newspaper, which encouraged other members of the carriage to join in with answers. Similar to evacuations during the war,
but also not really similar at all, our tragic event had brought people together which meant for the first time ever I finished a crossword in the Independent. To be
fair I'd never done a crossword in the Independent before, but that's not the point.

On top of all this pain, my laptop also died yesterday, which is why this daily blog has not yet happened daily. This was the laptop that had all the sound
effects for our show on it. The laptop that had all the scripts on it, and the laptop that meant I could change my facebook status between shows.
I managed to take it to a repair shop which means it will now be 7 -10 days before I have to stop using Sam's laptop. Obviously these Apple people have no concept
of emergency. Here is a picture of me being very sad while repair man was bored of his eyes will the dullness of his tedious job.

This was not the best of days.

Luckily today has already taken a massive turn for the best. Waking up in our flat this morning I realised just how good it is. Unlike last year's flat, this one is
actually near everything and doesn't have a lonely psycho as a landlord. Its been nice to head down a tad early and take in the city before its filled with screaming
flyerers, stilt walkers, sh*tty American students and general mayhem. Although at the moment its eerily quiet. No posters are up, no hustle and bustle and no
cow head attached to the body of the Uddebelly which means it looks like a giant purple farmyard accident. Its the calm before the storm. After yesterdays madness its very much appreciated. Things can only get better, and if they don't, I will sue National Express.

Quick points:

I finally met Sean Grant today who I will be doing a show with for a month. He is funny and ace so all good. Not sure what I would have done if he was tedious
and not ace, but luckily do not need to worry.

Quorn Scotch Eggs do taste like pork.

Ed at the Underbelly has no idea how to make veggie burgers.

Bringing a bottle of water on stage can become a 5 minute talking point.

More blogs tomorrow hopefully and I promise it will have substance!

Sorry once again for total lack of blog. As explained before it is the Edinburgh lead-up. Only three days till I head across the border where I hear the weather is nicely rainy and cold. Good to know my expectations wont be let down then. I promise that once I get there you shall once again all receive daily bloggage and updates of the Fringe madness. So until then here be a brief rundown of the more interesting aspects of my life since last blog. I shall give each section headings so that it seems like a shitty article in the Daily Mail.

CAMP BESTIVAL

I headed up to this delightful mini-festival last weekend for some gig action. Whilst I was looking forward to it, there was slight disheartenment knowing that Latitude was going on at the same time with a far more mega comedy line-up. Latitude smatitude though, as it was a damn good weekend overall. Highlights include watching Matt Reed's pop up tent not pop back down when we had to leave (not so easy now is it? hahahah), insulting a burlesque dancer, eating tiny cucumber sandwiches, seeing the biggest pig ever (seriously, it was the size of a bear), DJ Barry Peters, and JJ Whitehead trying to form a pick-pocketing circle out of the kids in the front row of the comedy tent.

Downsides were: a sun burnt nose, someone I know talking to me all the way through the only act I wanted to see, and going on an exercise bike that charged your phone, only to slog for 20 mins and not even gain a bar of battery. Suckfest.

Both nights I did were a lot of fun though and props to the Donnelly, Martin, Reed and Dixon who made it all bearable. Best line: Chris Martin's name for a camp superhero - Wolverqueen. Lovely work.

RUG SITTING

Last night I did Terry Saunders bloody lovely gig 'Sitting On A Rug' in Brighton. Rather than follow a normal gig format, the first half is stand-up sets, but the second half is the comics sitting on stage and having a chat. Tried some new bits in the set bit, 50% of which worked and 50% of which sucked massively. Also I wrote a proper joke. However it is a verbal gag, but please do ask me when you see me cos I'm hella proud.

On journey home Kevin Shepherd and I devised new types of comedy shows for Terry to pilot. Best idea was 'Odd Laughter In Places.' Just someone manically laughing in inappropriate places. Much opportunity for fun to be had. Or not.

On the way to meet Kevin and Terry I had to get a train during rush hour. In a mere 30 seconds as the doors closed and my face was pressed into someone's sweaty back, I realised how much I never ever wish to return to rush hour commuting. I think its the closest humans get to being treated like animals only without the dog biscuits and stroking.

TEA (AND CAKE) TIME

This show is so close to being ready it almost hurts in the face. We finally nailed the scene that we so hadn't nailed before and its all just tiny tiny bits that we have to sort before we do the first show next Thursday. Next Thursday? Arrrrrrgh!! Typing it makes it all the more scary.

Today we bought costume. We had no idea what the costume would be and so it took 7 hours in the West End going through what I can only describe as the bit of Inferno that Dante forgot to leave in. Primark is quite possibly the worst shop in the world and not just because it makes third world children make all its clothes. On a much less moral level its like some sort of overheated battle field where everyone that has ever been on Jeremy Kyle fights over a £2.50 polo shirt. Luckily I only have to go there once a year when Edinburgh costume is needed otherwise I think it would start to give me the compulsion to kill.

Strangely despite the fact that its such a terrible place, people (including my girlfriend) seem to see it as a truly wonderful place. I can only put this down to people liking a lot of truly horrible things. I will never understand how Ikea, Soulja Boy or Nazis every got popular, but they did and it again proves that people are dickheads.

We are still on the hunt for someone to be in a bear suit in a show for the last 30 seconds of our show. We've got a few people booked in but desperately need a volunteer for July 31st. Sadly the person doing it doesn't really get anything out of it, apart from getting to wear a damn cool bear suit. To be fair, what else would you want in life? If you are up for it, especially on the 31st, please let me know.

ROSIE AND BELLA

Our cats now have a cat flap and cant work out for the life of them how to use it. We have to leave it propped open or they cant work out how to push the flap bit. I've tried physically pushing them through it but they use peaceful protest tactics and just flop as still as possible so they cant fit through. I'm starting to think they might well be the first ever special needs cats. Today Rosie spent five minutes hissing at herself in the mirror. That's just stupid.

Right that's all for now. Sorry if its not particularly insightful or witty but at the moment my brain is filled with trying to do new gags for the stand-up and bits for the sketch which means that all other times I am reserving the funny. Frankly I'm miserable, but its all for a good cause. :-)

Will resume all writings from Sunday onwards!

So just mere weeks to go to el big Eddo, and I'm very pleased to say that finally our sketch show is finally a show. Our last preview went well and people said they liked it which was lovely. There is still heaps of work to do and thats why this is my first blog in two weeks, because every ounce of time is being spent on Edinburgh prep for Tea and Cake II. And I mean every ounce of time. If there was a weighing scale of time, it would be massively overbalanced on one side and strangely some flour on the other side. No one knows why. Which is where the problem lies, because I am also doing a 30 minute stand-up show, which has become somewhat neglected. Its just sitting there high up getting all floury.

Its not a conscious thing neglecting the stand-up show, but it has happened as a by product of several things. 1) I am only doing a 30 minute set as part of a double header with an act who lives nowhere near me. This means we cant really do previews as such, unless you count me doing 30 min sets at normal stand-up nights as previews. 2) Normal stand-up gigs disappear in July, and are replaced with preview nights, meaning that I haven't had many gigs. 3) The few gigs I've had have been MCing, which means I haven't really been giving my 30 minute sets any kind of airing. 4) I've had to cancel many of the few gigs I have had in order to rehearse to make our sketch show some sort of show.

So all the solo stuff has taken a back seat, which isn't ideal. In an ideal world I would have a car that flies, a tiger that walks on two feet and wears a suit and the ability to shot flames from my eyes whenever I want. But none of those things are realistic. So in an ideal realistic world I would be spending 50% of my time on the sketch show and 50% on the stand-up. While somehow also having 50% for life and boring things like budgeting and random writing jobs and MCing normal gigs and 50% for for seeing my friends and drinking because the weather has been nice apart from yesterday and today which have sucked. Those with any maths knowledge will realise that that equals 200% which is not remotely a percentage and therefore isn't realistic or attainable either. Maybe I should go back to hoping for the car that flies.

I am going to have to spend the next three weeks only working on the stand-up with a good amount of time spent of sketches. My girlfriend, friends, family and bank will hate me, and I will be creating social suicide. But alas it is what's needed in the name of comedy and I am a true warrior of mirth.

Ahem, I should say though that before anyone plays any tiny violins, - although that is a sight I love much like watching big people play ukuleles, and midgets play the double bass - I would like to point out that earlier I missed number 5). Number 5) is the most important one. It goes like this:

5) In the last few weeks I have been to see several live music gigs, enjoyed the sunny weather, slept in loads, got a new wii game, and persuaded myself I already have 45 minutes of material, which I do. Only it doesn't all work. And instantly in those last two sentences all the sympathy I spent so long garnering from you was shattered. Hence the torturous few weeks ahead are self inflicted. Here's to Edinburgh and comedy and now off to lock the door, close the curtains, and tell everyone I'm a little bit dead for a while...