A couple of nights of drinking (a tiny amount) and a couple of mornings of waking up early have thrown me all out of whack. The Fringe is only just over halfway through and I felt like a wreck today already. In the podcast I mildly hallucinated at one point and on stage tonight I felt the beginnings of a sore throat developing. I've done pretty well at keeping fit and eating healthily so a full on Fringe lurgy could be a disaster.
There's no time to relax - I had to file my Metro column this afternoon and was also doing another Set List at midnight and numbers for Talking Cock have not picked up (though the podcast seems to be regularly getting a hundred or more in, so that's a big positive that might save me from coming out with a loss). I was at a physical and mental low, but as long as I can stay alive for the next 11 days then all will be fine.
For the moment I am living life through the fug of tiredness which makes it hard to chat or to think or to remember where you know a familiar face from. That was not a very useful place to be in when I knew I was about to improvise comedy at Set List and I nearly texted to say that I wasn't well enough to come. But I'm glad I didn't do that as tonight's show was the best Set List I've been involved in, with all of the acts approaching things from a different angle and all of us managing to hit with pretty much every topic. I watched the first two acts and was trying to work out what I'd do if I had their subjects but my brain was blank. But they were being witty and imaginative and killing. I could be walking into disaster here.
But somehow once I was up on stage everything fell into place and I had one of my best experiences with this demanding format. Sometimes being a bit out of your mind can be the best way to do this. The mouth talks but the brain doesn't know what's coming next.
Funnily enough the act after me got a topic along the lines of "Justifiable Hitler Moustache", which might very easily have gone to me. The man setting the topics had no idea I'd done that show. If only it had I could have done an hour!
As it was the buzz I got from doing a good set was enough to make me forget about being well (and stupidly have a couple of drinks). There are enough good things going on this year to make up for the mild disappointments, but the fact that I still have 21 more shows (not including extra gigs) to go before I can go home is a bit terrifying and overwhelming.
There is certainly little to no danger of me seeing any other shows at the moment. I still have all the limited edition programmes to sign and mail out and a sitcom pilot to supposedly finish by the end of the month. Ha ha ha. Yeah, right. Every year this just gets a little more punishing. But tonight I thought if I am going to die, then in a damp underground cavern in the heart of Edinburgh might be the most apt place. If I die in this town I am going to haunt the fuck out of you all. You might not come to see me when I am alive, but I am coming to see you when I am dead.
