The Fear Blog. Part 3.

If there's one thing that you should watch for in Edinburgh, it's letting the place bite you in the arse. If you let your guard down or get complacent, it will take a chunk out of you. Today I put on shorts. The sun was suspiciously ruling over the sky. The clouds waiting in the wings. "Come and play, Ed" said the sun. "Yes, dig out those shorts. All will be well." I climbed up from our place to the Burns monument. A very pretty panorama awaited me after a lovely waft of wild flowers. Just as my heart rate started to drop, the rain clouds ambushed me, the air chilled and it started to bucket it down. Edinburgh knows there are comics here. Even the weather systems feed reflect the all-pervasive manic depression. I seem to remember that being called pathetic fallacy. Nice one Mr Chidlaw. You taught me so much for which I have no useful outlet.

I had had a very turbulent sleep again. My bed is soft and saggy. You can be comfortable, but I shudder to think of what damage it is doing to my already warped spine. I awoke with a blistering hangover at 8am and then fell back to sleep only after the inducements of mobile phone youtube and weetabix. I used to think of sandcastles to lull me to sleep. Now I think of Napoleanic memoribillia, muskets, artillery and suchlike. I may complain about the all too sporadic presence of women in my life, but the fact that I get any is a fucking miracle.

After giving up the search for a legendary Tesco Metro which is supposed to be near our flat, I then went on a quest for WIFI. I paid a whopping £2.50 for a Starbucks coffee only for the WIFI to fail after 20 minutes. The staff shrugged.  It's outrageous. Why do they actually think that any one who likes coffee goes into the place? Not for the piped jazz music. This is Edinburgh. Cheapskate writers need their WIFI.I finally found a free source in the performers centre. I was about to send out some press releases before spotting a hatchet job done on one of my flatmates. The reviewer (some turd basket from the Scotsman) said "This show was free. Frankly, I think that's too much.

"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Why is it that backseat comedians have more power than people who actually have the power to amuse? If hacks want to slag off a crumby phone app, fine. But rubbishing a stand up comedian just to flex a muscle is vindictive. No journalist in their right mind would give a poor review to anyone under the wing of a powerful agent, but they're happy to use unrepresented people as target practise. I hesitated before sending out emails. I want to make sure the show works. I can't give them an excuse to sharpen their knives on me. I decided to send out emails on Wednesday. This gives me two days to days to iron out problems with the show. All of a sudden I remembered a solitary man in the back row of yesterday's perfomance. I hope he was a loner and not a comedy reviewer, although in essence it's the same thing. All this is wishful thinking, of course. I highly doubt if the media will swing along to my show. I am rightfully ambivalent about the eventuality.The rain continued to pour and my saturated shoes turned into footspas. I made changes to my show and was late leaving the house. Flyering was never going to be effective in this weather. People have umbrellas in their hands and aren't minded to stop. The umbrella almost provides a zone of protection from incoming flyers. Shields up! Even so, I only managed 30 minutes of it under a bridge. Flyering, that is.

Four Swiss people were joined by a middle-aged woman who wants to start comedy. The show started off very informally and then four Scottish people came in. Although the crowd were the smallest so far, they were incredibly appreciative. Barely a line failed and I actually felt very lucky to have them. They were enjoying themselves far too much, and so was I. One of the Swiss guys said "That wasn't funny. It was hilarious and brilliant. Brilliant and profound." They looked like a bunch of people who had had a superb hour. I asked them to write audience reviews and they agreed. Of course "hilarious, brilliant and profound" today could well be "shit, boring and clunky" tomorrow. I may be caught have been caught in shorts, but I've got my mental umbrella up.

The older woman was slightly less impressed. I think perhaps my liberal use of swearing put her off, and maybe lampooning my mother's advice. She put a pound in my bucket. "Listen to your mother" she said. Pssh. Open spots.

Called my friend Lottie for a chat. She's a depressive musician type who complains about the inauthenticity of stuff. She has a brilliant voice, is very amusing and a real tortured artist. She makes me look like Bambi. I like spending time with her, however. Some people put me in a good mood, regardless of what they say.

Off to see Tony Law tomorrow. The man is exceptional.

Always delighted to see yet another piss weak online scam.

So, I’ve collected some thoughts on how to deliver the best scam, based on what already seems to work.

1. No matter how much of a scam it obviously is, mention the fact that it DEFINITELY ISN'T A SCAM. Try something like “We’re all fed up of those online scams, right? Well, this is different (i.e. not a scam)”

2. Get lots of domain name to link to the same page. The more implausible the better:

Relaxinghomejobs.com

Solveallyourproblems.org

Whybothergettinguptousethetoilet.bag

3. Make your site look like a real online newspaper: “The Daily Real News” for example with a headline under the ‘finance’ section: “Idiots make money for free by sitting around.” Something along those lines. Have other tabs like: international, politics, economy, lifestyle. But make it so that when your visitor clicks on them NOTHING HAPPENS. Wouldn’t want to distract their attention now, would we?

4. Use poor quality jpegs from institutions such as google, news week, NBC etc so that your ‘as featured on’ reassurance section looks like you’ve just got them straight off the internet by right clicking ‘save image as’ or by chopping up a screenshot, without any legitimate dealings with those people.

5. Never say WHY you are advertising the fact that you have made loads of money. “I made loads of money. You could too.” Why would you set up a website about this? Why would you go to that bother and then produce a really cheap, underfunded, horrible website? Just gloss over it.

6. Use testimonials. We all love real, human stories about people like us. Tell us about John Cooper and his debts, and how suddenly the money came pouring in. Show us a bank statement. Go on. It’s what normal people would do. Whip out a bank statement. I’m rich. Look. Even better, get a photo which is featured on another scam site and then just give them a completely different name for inexplicable reasons.

7. Looking for a point of entry? Keep getting rebuffed by spam filters? Use pop ups. We all love pop ups. Try and get in between viagra and horny girls in your area. That's prime retail.

Good luck!

Ed O'Meara - Literally Literary Reviewer...

What Every Man Thinks About Apart From Sex by Shed Simove

Consider Dante's Inferno, Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, Bronte's Jane Eyre, Brown's Da Vinci Code. All earthshattering classics, all genre defining masterworks, all towering obelisks of human civilisation. Well, except for the Da Vinci Code, which (nevertheless) can be utiilised practically without any serious buttock rashes or chafing.

However within all these magnum opi, these very pillars of literary triumph, there lie scarcely perceivable weaknesses; fine fault lines of plot, continutity, character or dialogue that threaten to undermine the entire work. Those moments when Dante's muse abandoned him, Bronte was distracted by a housefly or when Chaucer quoth: "Sod this for a game of dead Frenchman jenga. I'm going down yonder tavern for a cheeky mead." And so, such imperfections, such shortcomings, such flaws have plagued artists since time immemorial.

But not so in the work of Sheridan "Shed" Simove. For within these pages lie not only one of the greatest insights into the human condition ever committed to page, but something more fundamentally important. For this is the first and only literary and academic work which is ENTIRELY WITHOUT FLAW. There are no plotholes, no clumsy dialogue, no errors of judgement, grammar or logic. By the very nature of the work, its perfection is indisputable. All this can be immediately proven beyond discussion with one central concept:

Because this manuscript is entirely empty, not a single word is out of place.

This is the only work that, with only one edition, can be understood by every language in the world, every creed, colour, culture. Every disposition of human existence: from the bedazzling heights of the learned scholar to the animal-like gruntings of the illiterate X-Factor contestant.

Truly then, this work has the power and the destiny to unite humanity. Or if not humanity, then at least manity (by which I mean males, rather than manatees.)

Click image to view on Amazon

Diluted Squash

Sportswear-clad kids who hang around in front of shopping precincts get a lot of stick from the police. They could avoid suspicion of wrongdoing by carrying around squash rackets. Then passing police would think, "Look at that large group of young squash enthusiasts enjoying a pre-game cider." Sports equipment generally helps your image, with the exception of baseball bats. They just make you look scarier. Sometimes it’s very subtle. A bag of golf clubs makes you look like a sportsman. A single golf club makes you look like a psychopath. Chav kids could do worse than hiring themselves a caddy.

My flatmate’s from Ethiopia. He’s a big, black bloke with dreadlocks. He looks like a rasta but he’s not much of a rasta. Last night we got stoned and listened to Dire Straites.

I was getting squash coaching in a café. The guy was explaining techniques to me. “Treat your squash racket like an extension of your arm” he said. Then I spilt my coffee.

Caddy required

Choo Choo Pain

I was on the train up to Edinburgh enjoying peace and quiet when a 4 year old started talking into a plastic phone behind me.

"Yes Mr Hippotopamus. Yes Mr Hippotopamus. I will tell mummy that you are coming to supper. Mummy will make fish fingers because I know how much you like them."

I turned to him. "Hey, what's your name little boy?"

He looked up eagerly. "Thomas"

"And who are you talking to Thomas?"

"Mr Hippotopamus. He's my best friend!"

"Yeah? Well, I have an idea. Why don't you tell Mr Hippotopamus that this is a designated Quiet Carriage and you're not permitted to make your call here, okay?"

Cute kid, but a real attitude problem. I find it best to nip that in the bud at an early age.


Unbelievable.

In which I get the better of my brain (for once)...

I run a comedy night every Tuesday and (like it or not) the amount of stress and adrenaline involved generally comes back to haunt me when I’m trying to sleep. Generally the same scenarios will play out over and over again in my fevered, fatigued brain like a malnourished, sleep-deprived hostage being strapped to a fairground carousel by demented, whirlwitzer-loving terrorists. Think Adam West's Batman, but on acid...which he probably was.

Last night, however, I didn’t bother going onstage. We had too many acts as it was, and you can only push an audience so far, particularly when there’s only 10 of them and they’re going to the toilets in shifts. Tag team weeing, if you will. As a result, the night was admin. Not unstressful, but I didn’t have to make the mental shift from organiser to entertainer, which makes the same grating noise as the gear change on my poorly maintained bicycle. (My level of general concern over my bicycle makes me convinced that I'm not ready for children, as I'm sure I'd continually spray them with WD40 and then just hope for the best.)

Strange then, that my brain decided to concoct some half-assed dream about a comic (who wasn’t even at the night) cruelly critiquing my routine (which I didn’t do) to pieces. As far as stirring up paranoia, it was a pretty weak effort on the part of my subconscious – half-baked, poorly researched, plot-holed, scare mongering. Apparently the self-sabotaging part of my psyche has restructured its business plan around the Daily Mail. Tonight, presumably, I will wake up in a terror sweat over the fact that vampire immigrants are nesting in trees; carrying off nuns and orphans by the hand-basketful. Or maybe I’ll get my wires crossed and wet the bed over the fact that a dog has adopted a squirrel (or something) and now the squirrel is barking and dragging blind people around.

The upshot was that I was able (after a cursory inspection of reality) to say “Shut up brain” and go back to sleep, comforted by my long-term sense of intangible dread over fly-by-night phantasms. If this was something that we could all master, the world would be a less problematic place.

A Royal Weddink...

The media seems to be astonished that the fiancée of the heir to the heir to the throne should have been plucked from the 'umble middle classes. Afterall, Catherine nee Kate Middleton is from a humble village in Buckinghamshire and attended the local comp, AKA Malborough College public school.

What mighty social barriers have been broken! To think that some posh person might marry a much, much posher person. What barriers come tumbling down in the name of love...First black president my arse. Change the record, Obama.

Kate Middleton has described both William and herself as "very down to earth". It's just that the piece of earth they are down to happens have palaces built on it.

Old Etonian David Cameron responded to the news in a manner befitting Her Majesty's Chief Toff:
"When the news was announced during the cabinet meeting, a great cheer went up and there was a great thumping on the table...then some oik threw a bread roll at me."