My little Andrew left me today. And even though while he has been here he has done all he can to keep away from me, drinking with his new showbiz mates and when they are not available still preferring to go out for dinner with people from our audience rather than spend time with me, I knew I would miss his stupid little face. He has chosen a good time to go, just before the misery of final week strikes, as audiences start to dwindle and tiredness sets in and even the most dead-hearted of comedians starts to miss their home.
I headed to the bank to pay in a heavy load of weekend coinage, but disaster struck as the paying in machine was broken. I could have gone back home again and dumped the coins, but was on my way to do a book reading, so decided the best course of action was to get some little bags and count out the requisite number of coins. I was doing it old school. I managed to bag up a fair amount of the change and lightened my load, but thanks in part to the malfunctioning machine, plus a middle aged couple at the counter who had had their cards stolen and were regaling the teller with their life story, the queue was pretty long (and I had already been in the bank for 45 minutes). An employee of the bank came down the line to see if any of us were conducting business that could be done via the machines. I had an armful of bags of coins.
"Are you paying in cash or a cheque?" he asked somewhat redundantly.
I gave him a look and he noticed the bags.
"Oh, you're paying in coins," he observed and I gave him a sardonic smile.
"Are you aware that you can pay in coins with the machine now?" he asked.
I was of course aware of this, but was feeling a little miffed about my day having been partially derailed and this man's lack of understanding about what I had been through and for some reason decided to be the kind of prick I would usually write about here in disparaging terms. I could have just said that the machine was broken but instead I did a false smile and sarcastically said, "Yes, I am aware of that."
He failed to pick up on my annoyance (or perhaps chose to join in with the "let's be pricks" game) and said, "Oh right, but you don't want to do that then?"
Even though the machine had been off line for at least 45 minutes he obviously hadn't realised this (I had been talking to his colleague who had been looking into whether it would get fixed and who had helpfully assisted me in bagging up coins when it seemed that that was unlikely), and I could have just told him politely, but taking on the demeanour of the kind of prat who enjoys having one up on someone and milks it for all they can I said something along the lines of, "No, I would love to pay in at the machines, but the problem with that plan is that it seems the machines are not currently operating correctly." Where had this sketch show style character come from? Why was I doing this? The man scurried off to see if he could sort out the problem and I didn't have time to tell him that people were looking into it already.
There were only two counter staff and it happened that when I finally got to the front the woman next to me was also paying coins in for charity. And the bank only had one coin weighing machine, which seemed an oversight, especially given the unreliability of their coin paying in machine. The queue got longer behind us. The teller weighing the woman's coins said, "Do you know that you can pay in coins at the machine now?" and I had to stop myself butting in and shouting, "No, you can't, it's broken, you motherfucker." But she came back too quickly saying that she had to get a signed receipt for her charity. SCOPE, fortunately (and correctly) trust me to be honest. I am no Andrew Collings, trying to short-change disabled children.
With a lighter load I walked up to Word Power book shop to do what I imagine will be my final reading from "How Not To Grow Up" (at least until it is republished next year). It's a tiny shop, and people were crammed in and everything was rather polite (and my tattoed step-son from last Saturday's podcast told me that I was talking in my phone voice - that's my author's voice mate), but the hour passed quickly. I decided to record it so that those of you who couldn't make it to one of these readings can have a listen. It will be going up as an extra Collings and Herrin podcast some time on Tuesday (I don't need that Northampton ninny to do podcasts).
Perhaps it was the fact that Andrew had gone, or maybe (I hope) it was because I was missing my girlfriend, but I felt a bit blue for most of the rest of the day. Even though there's just over a week to go it felt like that this was an impossibly long time and that the Fringe should really be over in the next day or two. It usually feels like this to be honest. As with one side of the 1980s Phil Oakey's hair, the Fringe is too long. The prospect of performing to ever smaller audiences didn't help, but I, like many other performers I fancy, was wishing it was over now.
I stood back stage at the Ballroom really not looking forward to the show, wearing my street suit, which was flecked with rain, trying ot build up the energy and desire to do the show. I was expecting a half-full room, but amazingly it was looking pretty packed (I think my canny audience know that they can save £2.50 if they come on Monday rather than Sunday - it's silly to have weekend prices for the Sabbath show). And, of course, almost inevitably it turned out to be one of the better shows. And equally inevitably and pathetically that cheered me up. I am so shallow.
Right at the end of the show as I plonked the microphone stand down on the stage, I caught the skin between my thumb and first finger in one of the joins of the stand and tore a small hole in myself. It hurt, but I soldiered on and was actually hoping that the blood would flow copiously so I could freak out the audience who wouldn't have noticed this accident by revealing flowing stigmata on my hands. Alas it only started to bleed when I was off stage, but that allowed me and Michael Legge to riff on the fact that being on stage is the most dangerous job in the world. I boasted about the fact that I hadn't even cried when it had happened. I carried on as if nothing had happened. I am a pro.
The man who sells the Scotsman outside the venue excitedly called out "Mr Herring" as I came out into the damp Edinburgh night. "Your review is in!" he told me, delighted that he was sensing a sale here. "Yes, but is it any good?" I asked him. He ummed and ahed like he was Simon Cowell trying to shit up one of the contestants. He didn't go as far as saying, "I am sorry to tell you... it's a 4 star review," but it was close.
It turned out to have a picture and a "Hot Show" star by it and is a
solid 4 star review which makes the interesting point that it is good to see someone who is capable of doing the most offensive material making the decision to do something more subtle with this show (where it would be easy to just be confrontational and didactic). I am glad someone spotted this. It's purposefully a lighter and more silly show than last year. Most critics seem to want you to be pigeon-holed and doing the same thing year on year. And maybe that's the best idea if you want commercial success - although it seems gradually the public are coming round to me not being a predictable entity. This all cheered me up further (again horribly vacuous of me), although I was more pleased by the bag of goodies that you get for buying the Scotsman these days, some nice pickled onion crisps and some jelly beans and biscuits and coffee.
And still more cheering news when I got home as there was
a 5 star review in 3 Weeks. My early reviews had been a bit mixed (and I think the first three or four shows had been a bit variable and it had taken me some time to edit the show down and get used to the space and be able to slow down enough to let the jokes percolate) and I had been a little bit disappointed that the show wasn't getting as good crits as the audience reaction seemed to imply. So it's great to get these positive reviews at a time when I do actually have some tickets to sell. Hopefully it can help.
I celebrated by watching this extraordinary
Who Do You Think You Are in which Xander Armstrong, who one had never suspected of being too common turned out to be related to some right old poshos, and as the programme continued and we went further back in time became even more impressively posh. And SPOILER ALERT in fact he comes from Royal Heritage and can trace his direct line back to William the Conqueror. Which is something of a coup. Presumably, given the way that the further you go back the more ancestors you will have (2 parents, 4 grandparents, 8 great grandparents- and if you go back 30 generations- I think I worked out - 1 billion ancestors, though there is presumably some doubling up by that stage) it's likely that most of us have some impressive forebears in there somewhere, but to be able to trace back to them is still incredibly exciting. Also of course in that many generations it seems likely that someone who thinks he was the father is not the father (I always say that ancestry should be traced via the more provable maternal line), so there's a good chance that the line might be broken (but similarly given the incestuous nature of the royal court it's equally likely that the link would be remade in any case). But that kind of relationship must have been beyond Armstrong's and the production team's dreams. In a story that was already packed with incident and murder.
Worth a look though. Even though I have just ruined it for you if you didn't take heed of my warning.
Now, there are just 7 shows left, one for each weekday and suddenly and bizarrely it seems more manageable then when there were two Mondays still to go.
