Ups and Downs

Soooo the silly season has begun.

Gigs are no longer gigs, they are rooms full of people on works' Xmas outings, desperate to have a good time and blow the boss's budget if it kills them.

I enjoy the challenge of doing Xmas shows, you really never know what will be thrown at you and that keeps it interesting to say the least.

So on Thursday I got the train to Nottingham, to do a last minute gig at Jongleurs. I think it was their first Christmas night. They'd done the place up and even tho it was technically November, it felt a bit festive. It wasn't busy, about 100 people, so on paper it looked like we were gonna have an easy introduction to the coming month.

The bill was cracking, lovely, cuddly Mickey D as MC, musical comedy from Rick Wright (who always nails every gig I've ever seen him do) and the very funny (and very silly) Glenn Wool.

Mickey started the show in his usual chilled manner, and immediately this woman at the front started chipping in. She was seriously drunk and despite there being 6 chairs around the table had chosen to squash herself on one of her workmates' seat.

Mickey tried to deal with her tactfully and she began shouting all kinds of personal abuse at him. He eventually silenced her, and brought me on. I left her alone initially, but of course she didn't want to be ignored. She was rat arsed on red wine and wanted the world - or at least the other 99 people in the room - to focus on her and not us interlopers on the stage. I was good natured with her, had a bit of banter with her workmates who all looked like they wished she would just shut the fuck up, and before I knew it, my time was up.

Glenn went on, by this time she'd been warned twice to be quiet, and she started up again with her drunken abuse. Glenn basically gave her the rope and the dozy mare hung herself with it. Halfway through his blinding set, her and her poor colleagues left the building, making a huge fuss as they did of course.

I haven't been drunk for over 6 years now, I'll have the odd drink, but seeing that woman made me recall why I made the conscious decision never to get like that again! I don't think I was ever that nasty as a drunk but I sure as hell know I wasn't as witty and charming as I thought I was in my head.

Back to London on Friday, and after battling my way on London Underground (some days London just seems broken) I was doing the Balham Banana. It's one of the longest-running and most popular comedy clubs in the country. I guess it is considered a 'proper' comedy club.

It's so popular with comedians that I get to play there once a year these days, so it had been a good while since I was last there. It was interesting to see the differences in the audience, reflected I guess by the kind of people who have moved into Balham.

Thirteen years ago when I did my first open spot there, it was a lairy south London comedy night, a good mix of people but predominantly working class. On Friday night the front row were a bunch of Estate Agents with very plummy accents on their works' do. I hadn't thought about these gigs being Xmas shows until that point. I had an OK gig, nothing special but nothing terrible, so was determined to rock the joint when I went back on Saturday night.

On Saturdays you do two shows - a double up without the travelling, yay! - and I was opening in the little room upstairs, again it seemed to be filled with large groups of people rather than lots of couples or small gangs of mates. They also seemed a little twee, but I moderated myself and did fine.

Opening the second half downstairs, my last chance to have a cracker, I walked on to an air of indifference from the crowd. Lots of them were just settling in from the break, people were texting on their phones, a gang of girls were chatting (obviously they hadn't seen each other for a while and needed to catch up on all the gossip, tho why they chose a comedy club to do it in gawd knows).

There's no point in bullshitting, I didn't die but it was only my years of experience that prevented that from happening. I used every trick in the book and got some laughs, but never once got the entire room onside.

This uncomfortable experience was negated by getting the chance to have a catch up with my mate Michael Smiley, just back from making a horror film in Thailand, and getting to see a photo of his gorgeous baby boy.

I took the tube home and as I was waiting for my connection at Embankment station I saw the most horrific thing, this elderly man was dashing for the tube that was just about to leave, when he tripped and fell, banging his head on the steel floor of the train. He then slipped, so that his head was in the gap between the train and the platform. Luckily there was a nurse on the train and she moved him to safety, the underground staff came and kinda looked at him for a bit while radioing for help.

There was blood everywhere and the lady that was with him seemed frozen. As was I, I have to say, I figured there was nothing I could contribute so I chanted a few buddhist mantras for him under my breath and hoped he'd be ok. Then we were told to get on this train as no more trains would be stopping there for a while, so I don't know what happened to him.

I was in a bit of a state of shock as I stood on the packed train, and I realised that no matter how disappointing my night had been, it was a helluva lot better than that poor man's.

Woke up this morning shivvering and sneezing so I guess its the first cold of the winter, shame cos I have a birthday party to go to tonight, but not sure how welcome I'd be infecting everyone!