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Exhausted to the point almost of hallucination I wasn’t sure I’d make it through tonight’s show in Nottingham in one piece. Death seemed not only likely but desirable and I didn’t know how I would get my brain into gear for the show. It was the longest drive of the week and we were going there and back today and there wasn’t a single part of me that was looking forward to it.
My brain was running on 1% battery and I was in such low power mode that I can barely remember a thing about the journey there. We listened to the football. The success of Leicester almost makes up for the abject failure of York City this season. What a sporting fairy tale. Why can’t I travel back in time to the tail end of last season and put £10,000 on them winning the Premiership? Why can’t I do that? Why? Life is so unfair. If they’d let us all do that then world poverty could be wiped out. So I suppose the government would rather we were all poor. Typical.
And yet showbiz is showered with magic glitter and somehow once I was on stage my brain recharged and my energy was high and I was skittish and silly and had a whole lot of fun. Nottingham always seems to be a good one and tonight’s crowd were great. There might have been slightly fewer of them than there were last year (but I might be wrong) and I’ve certainly done better attended gigs in the city (a few years ago I had 500+ at the Playhouse - today there were about 270). There were a couple of younger looking lads in the front row (though they must have been adults as the club has a strict over 18s policy and was even attempting to bar punters who looked under 25 and didn’t have ID - I managed to get at least a couple of them in though - if you ever have problems with getting into a gig like this then do tweet me) and for some reason I decided to show them some of the pictures in the Talking Cock book, as if we were all 14 year old school kids. But the picture I opened the book at was St Augustine being tempted by the devil, so it was hard to talk this up as too sexy. But I gave it a go. Then I showed them a picture of a Victorian with breasts and a penis, which was much more appropriate for my attempts at inappropriateness. I doubt I will do this “bit” again, as funny and spontaneous as it was, mainly because we’ve finally nearly sold out the 3000 Talking Cock books we had reprinted in 2012. I never thought we’d see this day when my basement cupboard was heaving with the fuckers. But I am glad another rash financial risk by me and Chris Evans (not that one) eventually paid off and we didn’t end up out of pocket. If you missed out on one of the physical books you can buy the kindle version still, not that I get any money from that as the publishers are still trying to recover the advance they gave me for writing the thing! Proving that me and Chris Evans are better businessmen than a major international publishing company!
And though we still had a long drive home after the gig, it was great to have got through this most arduous part of the tour and still be alive. I would have taken death at about 4am, but ultimately I was glad that I wasn’t leaving my family behind just yet. And this would be a terrible week to die for someone who wasn’t a top notch celeb. The pressure is really on. Don’t dare die unless you’re bigger than Prince or you’re going to look very arrogant.
My job is a fun one and I know I am very lucky to do it. I am not complaining about my lot. I am an incredibly fortunate person. But it’s both harder than you think and easier than you think. The bit you think is hard is easy and the bit you think is easy is hard.
You idiot.
