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A man on Twitter responded to my fears about a second wave by making a comment about comedians happily staying at home doing nothing, giving nothing to the economy. I listed all the things that I had done so far in 2020 and even surprised myself with what I have managed in just over 8 months (5 of them spent mainly indoors) - a sitcom finished off and recorded, 22 RHLSTPs (so far), an entire (if short) book, a new ventriloquist act/podcast, setting up a Twitch channel and broadcasting 4 or 5 times a week, 3 snooker tournaments (including creating 30 new Mes with perfect accents and characters), a series of Taskmaster, another crack at Pointless, created some ideas for the new Spitting Image, down another March 8th International Men’s Day extravaganza, raised money for Refuge and struggling comedians, written 251 blogs, appeared on maybe a dozen podcasts/live streams of other people and managed to clear most of a field of stones.
Plus coping with family life.
Not that I had to really prove myself, but even by my workaholic standards that is quite impressive. If you ignore the stuff that is embarrassing and shameful.
I was angry with this man for impugning comedians, like as a group we’d all been delighted that we got to sit at home for all these months, like we were dragging our feet in getting back to work, rather than actually not being able to, because there are basically no opportunities. We have taken a huge hit, whether willingly or not it doesn’t’ really matter, because we needed to in order to help this disaster not turn into something even worse. And it seems likely that people not being cautious with the return to a ghost of normal life might well mean we won’t be able to do our night time job properly again for many more months and maybe years.
I was cross and had a go at this guy, who claimed to be his own boss and running an accountancy firm, though his twitter account suggested he was most interested in non-league football and drinking, so I think he just wanted to have a go at comedians, who he perceives as lazy, entitled, rich and somehow to blame for everything that is going on. Because that’s what we do now. Pick a group, judge them by our own preconceptions and not think too much about who is really to blame.
Of course being presented with the evidence that his original tweet might be inaccurate he just moved on to some other point as if he hadn’t seen the list of evidence that showed he’d started from a place of fallacy. Because he wasn’t even interested in a conversation. He’d decided who and what to blame and also what I thought (he was concerned the economy would be in trouble if we didn’t all get back to work - as am I - but he was less concerned that a second wave might mean we might have to all go home again and the economy will be properly tanked).
But what all this made me realise was that it’s time to change my approach to Twitter. I have a thick skin and have enjoyed being pedantic and playful with idiots in the past and it has rarely got to me in any significant way. I have searched for my own name, not as people see to imagine as a vanity exercise, but just to see what awful things people are saying about me - it’s actually a reality search and one that the vain would not enjoy. I have sort of enjoyed it in the past, but increasingly it makes me feel sad and anxious. So I am going to stop doing that.
Of course there’s always the occasional idiot who crops up to try and rattle you with offensiveness to your face. I partly felt like kicking the whole thing to the curb today, not because it got to me, but because the whole exercise was pointless, but that’s not fair on the people who use the platform in a nicer and more constructive way (where it’s possible to be critical or disagree without having made up your mind entirely already). I am sure I’ve made this resolution before, but I am going to block the cunts and not get drawn into stuff like this any more. It achieves nothing. And even if Covid and Brexit leave them gasping for their final breath in a ditch, the cunts are never going to admit they were wrong. It will still be the fault of the comedians I guess.
Anyway, really the point of this entry was to say, look at me and all the stuff I have done in frankly quite shitty and difficult circumstances. Obviously it’s not a proper job though or as important as pretending to run an accountancy firm (whilst apparently not understanding maths or statistics).
An absolutely thrilling frame of snooker tonight and a real feeling tha the players had both moved on as people. They certainly upped their game. To find out who won frame 107 then make sure you’ve caught up on the previous 106 frames, then catch it as an audio podcast Or
a video (if it's not up yet, then it will be soon)
You won’t regret it. Well maybe a little bit.
And if you enjoyed it and want to help keep live comedy going after this stupid war is over then
back the kickstarter
