Snow Business

I’m mostly spending today walking around outside with less clothes on than everyone else. I have sneered at snow warnings and temperature predictions with distaste. Oh no, -10c outside is it? How terrifying for you all. Might snow a bit might it? Get little cold toesies will you? Not me. Yesterday in Helsinki the plane I flew back to the UK on took off in a snow blizzard in -23c. Get in. Take your poxy British winters, I am now an experienced Arctic snow dude. Through the last week travelling around the gorgeous sights of Estonia and Finland I have felt cold that nearly made me cry. It didn’t, purely because my tear ducts had frozen to become another weak area on my face. Wrapped in so many layers, I was like a human onion. Peeling off any of them would have made you cry. Underwear, topped with thermals, with tshirt and jeans on top, then thick socks, a zip up, a warmer zip up, my jacket, hat and scarf. I was the winter version of a weeble, padded to the extremes. Had I been hit by a car, I would have softly bounced off to land gently in the half a foot of snow. Only my face exposed, it meant I was often strolling around working out how to hold my head so that the insides of my nose wouldn’t freeze incase I sneezed and killed a child.

I was quite an experience being away this past week. I had gigged in Denmark before but Estonia and Finland were two new ventures and both equally amazing. Estonia is a country I never would have thought of going to if gigs hadn’t appeared, but now having been I would highly recommend to anyone. Only 1.2m people in the whole place, you get an incredible sense of space and calm strolling around picturesque medieval streets. Surrounded by huge 12th century churches and city walls, while all the houses are coloured a mix of pastel reds and yellows, it all feels a bit magical. Talinn was a beautiful city, but Tartu in its miniature size felt like someone had allowed me to run around a children’s book. Thick snow and cobbled streets is a lovely mixture. The whole place felt like Disneyland with much less crying children. Again though, the cold tear ducts could have been a factor.

I didn’t get to see a lot of Finland, being only in Helsinki for one night and the weather being so cold that walking around sightseeing was impossible. I still saw enough to say that I like the city though and to be honest I fell in love with it on the ferry there from Talinn, staring out at the frozen patches of sea looking like an icy cobblestoned path. I think I’m just a sucker for still getting excited about snow. Yesterday while having a mini-sightseeing trip myself and Louis (the organiser of all the gigs and from Australia so still amazed by snow) spent ages watching some men unstick a ship from its frozen waters with huge steam rods, and then we purposefully stomped in thick snow, avoiding the cleared paths. It didn’t matter that I was only wearing trainers as the powder just fell off. Its lucky I was only there for one day or there’s a high chance I’d have no feet by now.

Finnish and Estonian people both similarly crave the sunshine and being used it, aren’t huge fans of the cold white stuff, but it still doesn’t have the same ‘sigh’ factor when it snows as in the UK. It may be partly because they can deal with it, roads are cleared in seconds, planes still take off. I think when it snows here, as much as love how it looks and the joy of building snowmen etc, we know our week is ruined. As a self-employed person its generally shit, as I lose tons of work due to the inefficiency of British transport and road services. It may also be because there are too many of us here and so we can’t just enjoy the tranquil stillness of a snow covered place. Helsinki is a busy city but still has less than 600,000 people there. We have nearly 8 million people in London. Thats’ more than the entire population of Denmark and Estonia put together. Yet we’re all crammed into one city. No wonder its a hassle. Snow makes darting round these people even harder on icy streets. It makes trains even more crowded as there are less of them. It makes traffic jams so horrible tear ducts will unfreeze through frustration.

As my plane left Helsinki last night, the last few glittering snow flakes hovering in the front of the aircraft, I thought I might miss the snow. I thought I’d miss the extra 5 minutes it would take to get ready to head out, adding every single bit of clothing. I thought I’d miss how quickly the fresh icy air would heal a hangover. But right now, I’m praying it doesn’t snow tonight. I have to go to Poole and something tells me that cold weather will make that journey harder than traversing across several countries in the North. Bloody England. Its great to be back.

Blog History

May 2012
M T W T F S S
« Apr    
 123456
78910111213
14151617181920
21222324252627
28293031  

White Whine

Things seem to be easier in Denmark. That’s what I’ve discovered. Well most things anyway. I’m currently staying in a magician’s bedroom in Copenhagen while he’s in Aarhus, and trying to find where he keeps the tea is a nightmare. So far I’ve discovered tons of glitter, a crystal ball, balloons, a toy racoon, a skateboard, a series of hats and I know where the beer is. His flatmate, a Danish comic called Niels who’s very kindly letting me stay, is still asleep. I have no idea how you wake a sleeping Dane in a kind way but I can’t help but think back to the Jorvik Viking museum and seeing a helmet destroyed by a Danish sword, so I’m staying clear. There is beautiful snow outside with children sledding down picturesque hillsides, while I am scrabbling around just wanting a cuppa. All is wrong with the world.

Well not all. Denmark, actually, is one of those countries that makes me return home and wonder why we can’t do anything right. Yesterday for example, I got on a three hour train journey. It cost me £45 to buy a ticket on the day, which is about 3 times less than it would in the UK. Then the train itself was clean, spacious, with information about where you were and when you’d get there every step of the way. The views were snowy fields and amazing lakes all the way. Compare that to any UK train journey it it merely seems like we get the withered, not talked about, younger brother of European travel. Even when the high speed rail from London to Birmingham is made I daresay the wifi won’t work, you won’t be able to find a plug socket for your laptop, you be able to either have your table down or move your arms and chances are someone who smells will sit next to you.

I do realise that complaints about ‘not plugging in your laptop’ are what Niels has been referring too as ‘white whine’. He often likes to point out when a complaint is something we can only make having the lives we do in the Western world. So far these have included things like complaining that the hotel yesterday kicked me out at 11am and him being annoyed his plate wasn’t big enough for all his food. At either of those moments someone from the 3rd world could happily have pointed out what arseholes we are and all the other far more miserable things in the world. Though this wouldn’t have stopped me from being tired, nor Niels from being hungry and all in all we’d have questioned how that person had got to Denmark from their country without a reasonable income and why on Earth they were in Niels’ flat.

Apparently, I’ve been told, Danish people complain a lot. But I reckon that’s because things work and make sense here, so when they don’t, its a surprise. I’ve never seen anyone new to London negotiate the Underground system as quickly as I did the S-Train system last night. I don’t speak a word of the language but it was all pointed out clearly how to get where, with everything running on time. I’ve seen people stare at Oyster card machines for well over 30 minutes hoping that their brain might explode before they have to actually get on a tube train. Yet we grumble and moan but never really complain and I think that’s because we are now so used to how badly everything works we’ve given up trying to change it. Not that I’d change it you understand. Otherwise I’d have to work a damn sight harder to write jokes and I’d feel far to content to ever rant about anything. Its all just white whine really.

Language Barriers

Less a blog today, more an observation. Perhaps store it somewhere and use it for studying or something interesting/rubbish to say at a party.

For the last two nights now I’ve have watched Danish comedians do stand-up in Danish, before taking to the stage myself, often late into the evening’s proceedings to shout funnies in English at the predominantly Danish crowd. There’s a number of oddities to this. One being that up until I go onstage, I have no idea of what the acts have been talking about. They may have covered every topic I’m about to do, ruining my set entirely. They may have said something that, unbeknownst to me, is a real taboo and ruins the room. Worse still, the compere may introduce me by saying ‘and next we have a massive bellend from England’, or ‘and now we dine on the blood of a British man’ and I stroll onto applause and a horrible trap. I’ve watched most of the acts on before me though, and the strangest thing is that no matter what language comedians are speaking in, there is a rhythm and a body language that appears to be universal. I have no idea what the set up is, but I can tell when the punchline is coming. There is a high use of clowning amongst Danish stand-ups, with large amounts of physical movement and expressions and so most of this I find myself chuckling away even though the context is completely lost. Its all very weird.

More weird is then going on stage and speaking English. I’ve been made to headline two small shows due to ‘being all the way from England’, the audience having no idea how unglamorous that actually is, and I’ve been doing my own hour show here too, the last one of which is tonight. I was asked to do my Edinburgh show which was primarily about UK politics and so I have spent several days tweaking it so it might work for a Danish crowd, worried I’ll have no clue of their parliament or how it works and that my points will be completely irrelevant to them. Turns out, after last night’s show they are not. The only thing they didn’t like/get was a reference to Wind In The Willows which was only popular here about 20 years ago. Its things like this that throw me. Doing an old routine at an amazing open mic night in caverns underground last night, I talked about having spots to some odd stares. After coming off stage one of the Danish acts looked at me and said ‘you have to say pimples’. Something so small yet the whole gag would’ve worked so much better.

Still, as it is, all the shows have been lovely. Danish audiences, rather wonderfully, sit and listen. I’ve been told several times now that ‘heckling is a British thing’ and apart from the odd attempt to contribute politely, they just laugh and applaud. An ideal audience despite only speaking English as a second language. It’s funny how the British people’s stubbornness to become bi or tri lingual helps us in these situations. Danish comics can only really perform in Denmark, as nowhere else speaks Danish. English comics can perform across the world without ever having to learn a single word of any other language. Its awful, but sometimes I feel lucky for our sheer forceful pig ignorance, and ever so respectful for the learned knowledge of other countries. It makes my life a lot easier.

Only one show to do tonight before I’m off to Copenhagen tomorrow so my aims are to walk around in the snow, then drink a ton of coffee – remnants of my monumental hangover from yesterday are still kicking about – to warm myself up again. Its properly shitting freezing here, and I’m donned in several layers from thermals to jumpers and still feel the bite, while local Aarhusians stroll around in a thin leather jacket looking all tall and pretty. Every one here is tall and attractive and I honestly feel like a tiny cold hobbit man scuttling around between them. Well more fool them, because at least I only know one language. Hah.

Aarhusing Again

This week’s excuse for not blogging comes from the fact that at 5am tomorrow I leave for Denmark. Well I say I, but I mean Tiernan Douibe, the person who’s names on my boarding pass. I’d like to be able to change that but I didn’t book the flights and it would cost £110 to do so, so I’m praying Ryan Air don’t have me arrested by the terror police and I’ll happily spend my flight pretending to be someone slightly different. Sure me and Tiernan Douibe will have some similarities. We both totally have beards, we both like the Wu Tang Clan, things like that. But where we differ is that Tiernan Douibe may speak in an accent. I’m not sure what yet. He may also laugh if he farts on the plane. In a loud way that states he is in no way embarrassed. He’ll also prounounce ‘water’ slightly wrong so that when he asks for some on the plane, everyone around him thinks he’s exotic. And he might walk with a limp. We’ll have to wait and see. I haven’t met him yet. It could all go horribly wrong though. Firstly Ryan Air may just not let me on. That’d be bad. Worse would be if I get to Denmark and they are expecting Tiernan Douibe who is a completely different comedian and his one hour show ‘I Fire Penguins From My Asses’.

This would be mostly bad because a) I can’t fire penguins from my asses, not least because I don’t have a pet ass. Nor do I have more than one bodily ass. Either way, it’d be hard and 2) because I have spent a week learning Danish things. There is nothing like an abroad trip to make you realise just how culturally ignorant you are. I know the Danish watch a fair amount of British TV but my gags seem to be filled with far too many vague references on people and places that outside of the British Isles are fairly pointless comparisons. I could go full ‘British Tourist’ and just say them anyway, only loudly, hoping they’ll get it, but instead I’m actually trying to write jokes. Mostly, as I’m doing two one hour shows, I’m trying to write about their government so I can squeeze it in and around my Edinburgh show of last year. Turns out that its pretty hard working out how other countries work. Well it is if you’re me.

I spent ages learning how British politics work, and now to try and get my head around Danish politics, it feels like a whole whirlpool of boringness. Its not the most interesting aspects of Danish culture I’ll give you that. Sure, there are bits that are. Like the fact that their Queen smokes, their Nick Griffin equivalent is the only Danish MP that supports David Cameron, and recently they too suffered from Norway’s butter crisis. But ultimately things are so similar yet with such subtle differences, that cramming them all in my brain isn’t very helpful to anyone. I’ve been watching the Danish show Borgen to help me, and what that has told me is that most Danish politicians are quite pretty, anyone who looks like an evil Pacey from Dawson’s Creek is definitely evil and that calling someone ‘Bent’ as a first name will be funny for the rest of my life.

Thing is, comedy is totally universal. There are things that will make people laugh all over the world and last time I was in Aarhus I found it an absolute joy to play. But I wasn’t trying to comment on the state of the nation. Nor was I talking for an hour to a theatreful of people. Hopefully, I’ll just wing the whole thing, say Borgen a lot, occasionally say how funny it is that their PM is called Helle and then break down crying. Or if all else fails I’ll learn how to Fire Penguins From My Asses.

Danske Bye Bye

After writing yesterday’s blog I did a rare thing and read it back. Usually I automatically assume that literary gold has seeped through my fingers and onto the keyboard like a Midas of language and so leave each post in the annuls of blogville to never been seen by my tiny eyes again. However, after reading back yesterday’s I realised that I am completely wrong and that apart from all the terrible word repetition, poor sentence structure and the general sense that I’ve read better ‘What I Did On My Holidays’ school reports from 8 year old children, it also seemed to just repeat everything I had said about 3 days ago. At first this concerned me, and it has only been today where I could easily churn out the same dross about being drunk again that its occurred to me that my week in Aarhus has been not entirely dissimilar to Groundhog Day. Only in Danish. And with no groundhogs. Or Bill Murray. So not really like Groundhog Day.

It’s been an amazing week and I’ve definitely learnt some things. Aside from the odd Danish words and the fact that I grinned everytime I saw a sign with an arrow pointing to a place called ‘Odder’, I’ve met some truly lovely and funny people that I doubt I would have bumped into on the UK circuit at all. We’ve all vowed to stay in touch and hopefully help each other get gigs in our own home towns. I have the odd feeling that I may benefit more from this than they do as I get to see beautiful Estonia or Finland and they get the Laughing Horse Camden. I’ll try my best to make sure that doesn’t happen. I’ve also learnt that I speak stupidly fast for a non-English speaking audience and have had to slow down my delivery rapidly here. I’m hoping I’m not conserving all the energy to do my first gig back next week at such top speeds various ear drums are broken and people’s heads pop with the pressure. Saying that, it’d definitely make for an interesting blog the next day. As well as speed of voice, I discovered while performing an hour last night, that only a certain part of my material is universal and despite being confident that I could nail an hour of material I found myself standing on stage really sweating about 25 minutes in as certain words like ‘emo’ fell on blank stares. All the other gigs I’ve played abroad have been to audiences who speak English as a first language and it was only clear by the end of the week that everyone I’ve been performing too has had to translate everything as well as react to it for its content. In a way they had a harder job than me. I managed the show with constant editing and had to delve deep into the recesses of my comedy brain, accessing mind folders far beyond my cerebral desktop, and pull out some really old crap. It seemed to work though and I finished the whole festival with a set at the gig I’d been hosting all week – that night hosted by the very funny Chris Brooker in my absence – where I decided to do material that they probably wouldn’t understand but that I wasn’t bored of hearing. Its these sorts of experiences and challenges you don’t get on the UK scene, even though I’ve definitely performed to some audiences who’ve taken as long to process a joke as someone who didn’t speak the language.

As I’m typing this the first few comics from the group are leaving and hugs, handshakes and nice words are being passed round. I’m going to miss the randomness of sitting on the beach with Dutch, Finnish and New Zealander discussing, oddly enough, Derren Brown, and the joys of meeting Danish people who’ve broken their arms running into walls while looking the other way. True story. And yes, I couldn’t work out whether to applaud the man or have him sectioned. My flight isn’t until 10.30pm tonight so I’m stuck with the sad job of watching everyone else leave while I stay in the city I’ve only enjoyed in their company until tomorrow when I wake up in my own bed, see the six trillion emails I’ve been ignoring and life resumes as normal. I’m looking forward to going home but goddamn I hate it too. Goodbye Aarhus, and for the last week, our home. Tee hee, sorry. I couldn’t resist one last pun….

Kvajebajer

Today’s favourite Danish phrase comes from a conversation at a Danish nightclub last night somewhere in the early hours of the morning. Yes a nightclub. Yes I am 30. Yes I mostly felt like at any moment someone might notice and make me leave and yes it was too loud and I didn’t get to sit down much. Besides all this it was fun, mostly due to being drunk enough to dance to shit 90′s music with brilliant Danish people and also because of one of the most wonderfully offhand conversations with an awesome petite Aarhusian called Sandra who taught me the word ‘kvajebajer’. The closest translation in English I’ve been told would be ‘stupid beer’ and its used when you’ve made a mistake and you say ‘ah well, my fuck up, I’ll buy you a stupid beer.’ This in itself is a great phrase and had I learnt it many years ago would probably have summed up many events in my life. The conversation with Sandra went something like this. She told me she worked in a school for special needs children and explained how that day a child had thrown a chair at her back and another had tried to stab her with a knife. I enquired just how on Earth a child at a school could have got hold of a knife and her response was:

‘ From the kitchen. (Pause) Yes, a mistake. (Pause) Kvajebajer!’ This was followed by an expression of sheer nonchalance and another beer for me. I like the Danish more and more everyday.

Yesterday was an epic day of many proportions. Attempting to travel to the Moesgard museum with Rose (a dry witted and lovely Dutch student helping at the festival), a badly misjudged distance meant that a two and a half hour walk later we were still an hour away from seeing The Grauballe Man – a twisted body preserved in the bogs of Denmark and looking not dissimilar to many people I’ve seen lying outside Wetherspoons after 11pm in central London – and instead in the midst of the Danish woodlands with nothing but these odd Dutch cinnamon rock stick and water for provisions. Its safe to say my orienteering skills were never a strong point and I think that I have relied on googlemaps for far too long in my life. It was an excellent site seeing trip of the countryside and coast though, despite being hit in the eye by a stick, falling off a bike (I, like fellow comedian Mark Watson, also have bike issues. Mainly that I can’t ride them. I consistently have issues with balance. Even my bank one is a mess) and being attacked by the sea. Yes. Not in a tsunami way and no way as drastic but sitting on a rock on the sand with the tide so very far out, the Dane waves appeared to go against all principles of the moon’s gravitational pull on the world and come all the way in soaking both our feet entirely until we raced back onto the road. As soon as we escaped the beach the tide happily went back out again. Ægir the viking god of the sea spoke and he said ‘back the fuck up.’

Twelve miles and several tired hours later I managed to catch Hari Kondabolu’s show at what might be one of the nicest comedy rooms ever, the Archauz. Hari is a US comedian who’s just been in the UK for a week or so doing Russell Howard’s Good News and a few gigs, and will be back at the Edinburgh Festival. He’s a truly truly excellent comic and had myself, Rose and the small gang of lovely and very funny Norwegian comics that I’ve had the pleasure to meet, absolutely howling with laughter on the back row. Do check him out if you get a chance.

Then shouting my way through REM, House Of Pain and Nirvana till 6am, waking up today wondering where my eyes have gone as they are so far back in my head I may never get them back and a sore throat that may well make all my other gigs a tad tough. Ah well, Kvajebajer!

Doing a show called Comedy In The Dark tonight, which is pretty much what it says on the tin. The compere – ace Danish comic Mads Brynnum has told me he will be naked. I have told him I won’t be trying to shake his hand.

Last note of today’s blog and it be a long one. You remember those crazy fun times myself and my friend Jacqui had sending the people of Red Bull a pointless complaint email? Do ya? No? Oh. Well it’s here:

http://blog.tiernandouieb.co.uk/2011/03/29/no-wings/

Well the lovely people responded at 5pm yesterday after what I presume had been a very long day at work. They’ve clearly spent some time on it and for your enjoyment here is the response:

It is true that Red Bull does give you “wiiings” (as opposed to wings) but not in an obvious conventional manner but by vitalising your body and mind, as seen from our humorous self-ironic cartoons.

I dare say that in the history of evolution there has never been a case of a human being been naturally blessed with real wings in the sense that you mean and Red Bull would not try to fool the general population at large into thinking that it was possible to drink our product and change their genetic make up to grow extra parts of the body!

I assure you that the style of the advertisements and message that they give have been passed by the Advertising Standards Authority and are deemed suitable for broadcasting to the viewing public. I am sorry that you felt the message conveyed in our commercials misled you in anyway into believing that Red Bull would persuade your body to sprout bird-like feathery appendages.

Please accept out sincerest apologies if any confusion has been suffered.

Best regards,

CONSUMER RELATIONS

Awesome.

Aarhus, In The Middle Of Our Street

So far my first trip to Denmark has involved an ungodly amount of sleep, a show and tell about a pornographic painting of the Danish Royal family, a free hoodie, some cheese and several people laughing at a man saying a word that sounded like ‘asskissing’. Its times like this that I can look at myself and think I am nothing if not cultured. Today’s blog hits you in the pupils from the office of the Aarhus Comedy Festival, situated in the heart of what I’ve been told is Denmark’s smallest big town. Or biggest small town. Its been described both ways to me and having only stepped from a minibus into the office and nowhere else, I am yet to work out which one it is. I would assume a big small town is like a large Lego landscape, where as a small big town is a not very large normal sized place. I am partly hoping that outside of this office I use several 16 peg grey blocks to create my own streets then construct a small car with flashing lights to drive me around while a man with perfect hair and a yellow face tells me facts. I have a feeling its going to be more like the former.

My flight this morning was at 7.25am which meant that I had to wake up at that sort of surreal time of 4am where it just feels like you’ve got up at night for a wee and someone’s tricked you into having to stay up. Its fine for a while, and the whole experience was made 100 times better by Nat very kindly giving me a lift to the airport as we had delirious early hour banter involving neither of us making much sense. Since then my body has been thrown into tired mode whereby my stomach doesn’t like anything I tempt it with, my eyes are like puffy bubble wrap with an iris, and its taking my brain at least 3 seconds to respond to everything. This hasn’t been helpful when talking to the Danish whose accents take a second to register words and the drive from the airport involved a lengthy 4 minute conversation revolving around me asking if we were staying in the centre of Aarhus, while the driver thought I asked if were we were – a large road by an empty field – was the centre of Aarhus. Cue hilarity/a huge waste of words and energy.

Luckily I am with nice people. Jim Smallman is here for one evening only and its been bloody nice catching up. All the other acts from around the globe seem great too. I am to be sharing a room with a Fin called Ali. He has no surname. I’m slightly concerned he will follow in the footsteps of other one named people such as Madonna or Jesus and be a tad difficult to deal with. I’ve been told he’s a lovely bloke though and so it seems I’ll be more concerned that my snoring will mean he won’t sleep for a week. I have been sneered at for wanting my own room, but no one seems to understand its for the other person’s benefit and not my own. When I pass out, my nasal cavity makes a noise like someone using a drill on a bulldozer in a dentists office. It penetrates walls. I’m often amazed I don’t wake up to find I’m surrounded by millions of snakes who’ve been lured by the tremors. I expect Ali will hate me by tomorrow.

We’re about to head off for a stroll round town now for which I will need to wake up in order to take in various things about the city for oh so hilarious purposes during my gigs this week. With any luck I’ll be able to do my entire riff on the new 3365 Space Moon Buggy set or Harry Potter building sets.*

* I have no material on this. I really should build on it. HA! HAHAHAHAHAAHHAHAHAHA! I’m so tired.

Wish You Were Here (Instead Of Me)

Despite having travelled all the hours to Exeter last night and all the way back, I am heading to Leeds tonight in just a few hours. Somehow I have managed to completely ignore the fact that such a journey will mean traversing most of the length of the UK in just two days, costing myself most of my life savings in petrol (despite the seemingly non-existent 1p reduction), churned out enough carbon monoxide to kill a bear dead were he to inhale it through an oxygen mask (no, I’m not sure under what circumstances this would happen, but fer Chissakes get an imagination, albeit a cruel, anti-bear one) and feel (pun fully intended) exhausted and tired/tyred/Michelen TYRE-d. For the first few years of this job all the traveling was definitely an exciting high point. Never would I have dreamed of seeing such exotic locations as er, Trowbridge or, er, Bishops Stortford. By dreams of course, I do mean nightmares. But regional meanness aside, it was a joy at first to get to see parts of the country I didn’t even know existed. This then elevated into heading to parts of the world I hadn’t been to before and the excitement and joy at getting to go and perform across the globe. What other job puts you in the enviable position of getting to do such things without having to either take part in boring meetings and dull workstuff or even worse, have to go to such places on a ‘holiday’ with ‘loved ones’. Gross.

But something’s happened to me in later years of gigging and indeed age, which means all this seems a tad overrated now. Suddenly all this maneuvering around the UK and abroad seems second place to actually staying at home and having a quiet night. Sad, grumpy and miserable of me I know, but I really like staying home. My stuff is there. I don’t have to go anywhere to get there. Its mostly warm. The plus points are seemingly endless, if dull. But I still find myself lured to appreciate them more than I should. On Monday I fly to Denmark for a week. Most people would be extremely excited about this. I however, have decided today, that I’m not. Firstly the flights are at times that make it completely unfeasible for me to get a train to and from the airport at this end. Secondly having a bag on board hasn’t been paid for which means either I have to pay to take 7 days worth of clothes etc and pay money I don’t have, or wear the same things a few days in a row and just take hand luggage. I don’t want the Danes first image of the Douieb to be one of a man who only has one tshirt and smells of unwashed incompetence. Beyond that it appears I will be sharing a room with a Finnish comic I don’t know during my stay, which worries me more for his sake than mine because I do tend to snore like a bulldozer with a blocked nose, but also concerns me in general because I am no longer 6 years old. Add this to the fact that I am doing workshops all day and gigs all night for less money than I’d be getting if I was doing the three gigs I’ve cancelled back home, and suddenly the whole week will be spent with me grumbling and resenting everyone and everything. I’m still going to go though. Because I’m a sucker for masochism.

I’m sure it’ll all be fun though in the end what with all the pastries. It always is fun in the end. Tonight’s gig in Leeds is worth the drive as its one of best gigs in the country as far as I’m concerned and last night’s in Exeter was great to. Well nearly all great. I had a moment of sadness when I did my boring old material about height and complained about two areas in life it was bad to be short in, when a 2″1′ tall man shouted ‘rollercoasters’ at me. My heart temporarily wept. I enquired if he’d ever been able to go on a rollercoaster and he said no. I swiftly concocted a plan for him to always offer to look after everyone’s bags while they went on the rides then he hits the casino with all their money. This seemed to cheer him up no end. I’m sure later however, he realised that this would merely label him a midget thief and thus make his life even worse. I’m glad I drove home last night.