26th July

A much needed day off today after a 13 hour shift yesterday, with four days and 22 hours of work left before a two week holiday. Not that I'm counting. With a certain sense of predictability I'm going up to Edinburgh for my 8th festival in the past decade. I know that I should have taken a show up there by now and it's been a long standing ambition. For various reasons it hasn't happened. This year it's been especially difficult having written a show that I was proud of but the prospect of doing it at the Fringe was knocked back by my employers. The romantic, artistic thing to do would be to jack it all in and follow the dream, but I can't go back to not having an income. I hope in the future I'll be in the position to do it.

Anyway, I warmed up for Edinburgh with a trip to Up The Creek on Sunday for a couple of previews. Stuart Goldsmith's show concerned his life as a recent father and his mental health issues, whilst Carl Donnelly did some enjoyable stuff about experimenting with hallucinogenics, his "flat earther" brother and other ongoing familial strife. Both are strong performers and the night was boosted by Seann Walsh appearing to do a 15 minute set ahead of a showcase at Just For Laughs in Montreal. Walsh is an act with a well honed persona and I enjoyed his thoughts about coming to terms with being in his 30s and "real adulthood".

It's unusual to see a comedian ask an audience which bits he should use, but I agreed with the general consensus that he should use some more physical material he had on the subject of drunkenness. This is likely to have a more universal appeal then his thoughts of Limewire, although I was pretty much the target demographic for those. This Sunday it's Sarah Kendall previewing her show and I may well pop down again.

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