7631/20570
Another 20 min set in Chiswick tonight which left me yearning for the slight chaos of last night. It was a flatter crowd and it was hard to ride the wave of comedy and I made some mistakes, forgot some bits and failed to bring my top game. It was fine and it was the same for the other acts (at least early on). But Friday and Saturday night club gigs are not easy and I am rusty and so must take part of the blame. Who would have thought people wouldn't want cancer gags on a weekend?
I was staying in Shepherd's Bush, courtesy of Sunday Brunch. I had decided to stay the night as Catie and Phoebe are away for a girls' weekend and Ernie is with his grandparents and it seemed crazy to drive home, just to be driven back in less than seven hours after I got home. So instead of getting me a car the TV show got me a hotel and parking, which was a good trade (as I think the hotel would have eaten up the entire fee for the gig).
I used to love walking around London and even though it was raining I elected to walk from Shepherd's Bush to Chiswick (and back). It was strange being back here after six and a bit years away and everywhere I passed held a memory. They were mainly happy or at least pleasant, unlike the weird and discombobulating journey through my life that Edinburgh can be.
Though to be fair memories of Shepherd's Bush do go back to the nineties, as we recorded out TV shows at the BBC and came down here for curries or drinks afterwards.
Lots of places have shut down, including Jamie's Italian restaurant (where I found out my grandma had died) and Albertine's (now a coffee shop, but where I had drunk much wine) and the Defector's Weld (also looks like it's closed or is being renovated - we recorded some of the sketch about my toaster robot there). I passed the Shepherd's Bush Empire and thought how weird it was that I played that venue (in about 1997 - not full, but it marked ten years of Stew and me working together). Along with presenting Top of the Pops this fact seems one of the most unlikely from my career, at least if you went to school with me. How did I end up in places that were so cool?
There was a cool bar on the Goldhawk Road where I used to take dates in the early 2000s - it's changed it's name and I can't even remember what it used to be called, but fun to think about what little I remember from drunken nights. I was sad to see, further on, the Goldhawk (again struggled to remember the name, think that's right though) where I used to drink with Catie, is now flats. I was around when that was happening, but still a shame to see it gone.
Further up was the spot where the police had apprehended a man in a beanie hat who they had detained one suspicion of stealing my mobile phone - there were looking for a black man with a bike and a black beanie hat, so they had come close with this man with the wrong coloured hat and no bike.
And so it went on.
London smells more of drugs than it used to. Or did I just not notice?
Though much has changed even in the short time I've been away, I was really happy to be back. And confused. As much of it seems really recent and I almost convinced myself I still live here. It feels very recent that I'd take Phoebe to Little Kickers and swimming in Chiswick.
My hotel room overlooked the green and the playground where we'd occasionally taken Phoebe when she was tiny.
I didn't go to visit our old house, though I passed a few that I'd looked at in the early 2000s and wondered how things might have turned out if I'd bought any of them instead. I seem to choose houses that no one else wants to buy. Might I have been better off if I'd chosen something more conventional in Chiswick or something smaller in Holland Park. I did buy my Bush house when I thought I was going to be living with a girlfriend and her son, but maybe in hindsight I should have spent the money on a bachelor pad in a more central location.
But then I wouldn't have what I have now.
And I had fun in Shepherd's Bush. Amidst the loneliness and tears.
