I sit typing this from the train home to London. I left Edinburgh only 15 minutes ago and already I’ve had a big sigh of joyous relief that I’m heading back. Yes there is some sadness its all over, but then I thought about how I’d feel if someone told me I had to spend anther week there and I looked forward to leaving again. As myself, Layla, Eri and Danny sat in the cab on the way to Waverley Station, we caught a glimpse of the Royal Mile. Once filled with confused idiot tourists, shitty jugglers and several people promoting their shows by lying on the floor or shouting or dressing up as a knight instead of just being talented. Now, it was just a mostly empty cobbled street with a few confused idiot tourists still there wondering where all the shitty jugglers had gone and getting conned into buying kilts. As another year draws to a close, lets look back on the facts and figures for this year’s Edinburgh Fringe Festival experience:
Amount of shows performed in: 62
Amount of shows I enjoyed performing in: 59
Amount of shows I did after saying yes when I didn’t really want to do any of them: 32
Amount of times I swore loudly after hanging up a phone call where I said yes to a gig I didn’t want to do: 30 (I had a sore throat for the other two and so didn’t waste my voice)
Amount of shows I saw: 19
Amount of shows out of those that I felt I had to see or people would get sad: 5
Amount of shows I watched and thought I could have written better gags for: 3
Amount of shows I watched thinking ‘goddamn, wish I’d thought of that’: 8
Amount of shows I didn’t see: 2,070
Amount of shows I didn’t want to see: 1,326
Amount of flyers received: 137
Amount of those flyers that thought they were being witty or original by putting a quote from a review that hated them on it, even though Stewart Lee had done that ages ago, and much better: 1
Amount of flyers I actually read: 7
Amount of flyers that didn’t really give any information what the show was about: 7 (might’ve been more, but I didn’t read them)
Amount of forests senselessly destroyed and animals killed in order to make flyers for shows no one wanted to see: 12
Amount of flyerers who had absolutely no dignity whatsoever: 472
Amount of actually good flyerers: 15 (ie Brett’s flyering team)
Amount of actually good flyerers who started optimistic and ended the month hating most things ever: All of them.
Amount of time spent in the Cow Cafe chatting to Keith Farnan: 50-55 hours
Amount of good ideas garnered from the time in the Cow Cafe chatting to Keith Farnan: 2
Amount of times it took before I realised I shouldn’t buy Diet Coke for £1.50 in the Cow Cafe when I could buy it for 55p around the corner: 8
Amount of booze I drank, measured in terms of my own bodyweight: 5 times my own bodyweight
Amount of really stupid things I did under the influence of alcohol: 0 (I’m very proud of this)
Amount of mildly stupid things I did under the influence of alcohol: 14
Amount of times Tom left the flat and had forgotten his keys: 4
Amount of times I mocked Tom for being a dick and forgetting his keys: 4
Amount of times I then left my keys at home and went out like a dick: 2
Amount of conversations I had about how the Edinburgh Fringe Festival is too long: 788
Amount of conversations I had about how broken I am: 1040
Amount of times people unnecessarily used the word ‘literally’ in conversation with me: 8524
Amount of people I liked that I saw during the month: 672
Amount of people I didn’t like that I saw during the month: 3
Amount of people I saw that based on first assumption I assumed I would not like and so didn’t speak to: 904
Amount of Twitterers met: 32
Amount of people I saw dressed in a giant animal costume: 2 (this is down on last year)
Amount of people I saw whose names I could not remember: 217
Amount of times I ate Chinese food: 2
Amount of times Tom ate Chinese food: 11
There are more statistics but suddenly I feel sick on the train. Sick on a train is not as exciting as snakes on a train. FACT. Must deal with brokeness (add an extra number to the figure above) and sleep. More tomorrow loyal blogees.
