Stories For The Starlit Sky.

Last night it was back to Regent's Park at midnight to see the latest and last installment from Daniel Kitson and Gavin Osborn.

The story was a story within a story. It told the tale of a young boy with insomnia and the story that his Dad had told him in an attempt to send him off to sleep; a whimsical naration about village assassins.

A truly lovely evening was had.

A congratulations.

To Tim Key and Jonny Sweet who each won an Edinburgh Comedy Award yesterday. Well deserved if you ask me. I am overjoyed by the news.

Early Birthday Wishes.

I received my first birthday card from my Grandparents today and it was beautiful:

Granddaughter,
It's easy to see you're someone who's special in so many ways...
You're thoughtful,
You're considerate,
You're lovely inside and out - and most of all,
You're someone who makes others feel special in return...

So on your birthday,
Wishing you all the happiness you bring,
Because you're a wonderful granddaughter,
And you're loved very much.

Thank you Grandma and Grandpa. I love you!

A thought.

It's inevitable, in a months time I will be the outsider at work. I couldn't care less.

Edinburgh Fringe. Day 8.

My last day in Edinburgh was a little bit of a let down. I tried, unseccessfully, to get tickets for Party and The Hotel, so spent the day sight-seeing instead.

In the early evening I met up with a friend at the Pleasance Courtyard and saw Tom Basden again. We had better seats this time but I did feel that he was rushing through. He has such a lovely voice, he's another musical comedian that i'd like to hear sing serious songs.

After a long cab ride accross town I arrived at the HMV Picture House to see Amanda Palmer. Upon approaching the queue I spotted her giving an impromptu performance to a small crowd of fans a little way up the street. I think she was singing Science Fiction from Rocky Horrow Picture Show.

We stood our way through a mediocure band and an interesting and very alternative dance troup before Amanda took to the stage accompanied by a brass band. She sang a few solo songs and one Dresden Doll's song before reading out a short story from her and Neil Gaiman's new book (Mr. Gaiman came out after her reading and treated us with a story too!).

As much as I wanted to stay, it was impossile if I wanted to make my coach. It was a rather rushed goodbye to a city I adored. No doubt i'll be back same place and same time next year.

Edinburgh Fringe. Day 7.

Another day and another early show, this time it was the Collings and Herring Podcast at the Underbelly. Andrew and Richard work so well together and it helped that Mr. Herring was on fire (his words, not mine but it was very true).

I spent the early afternoon packing and then it was off to the Pleasance Courtyard for an evening of entertainment, first up was Pippa Evans followed by Sarah Millican and Tim Key.

I had seen Pippa's preview in London and was quite worried that I may be disappointed. I almost feel ashamed to have thought that; it was truly lovely show. It was based around a variety show (a shambolic one at that) in which she played all the characters, Loretta Maine even made an appearance!

Sarah Millican was another preview i'd seen in London and to be honest, I think i'd enjoyed the preview more. Maybe it was due to the fact that the material was new and exciting for Sarah and myself when I saw it in London....?

Tim Key's 'The Slutcracker' was absolutely frickin' brilliant! I'd caught the preview at The Invisible Dot prior to the Fringe and thought it good but the final cut was something to behold. The set, the slides and the interaction with his sound guy, "Fletch", was made of awesome (Stephen Merchant was in the audience!).

I had bought a ticket to Ali McGregor's Late Nite Variety Nite but it clashed with Tim Key (which was pointed out to me earlier in the day). A few friends were going to see Sammy J In The Forest Of Dreams at midnight and as it was now do-able, I did it. We secured front row seats and I was lucky enough to be plucked from the audience to join Sammy on stage for a very breif dance.

Edinburgh Fringe. Day 6.

We were up early to catch Robin Ince's celebration of science show 'Carl Sagon Is My God, Oh And Richard Fynman Too' with Isy Lawrence and Peter Buckley Hill. Robin's passion and Isy's rants were a great way to start the day.

In the early afternoon we went to Robin Ince's Book Club featuring Ali McGregor, Helen Arney, Amy Butterworth and Carrie Quinlan. We were read to from some utterly ridiculous books and were treated to some lovely music.

My first ticketed show of the day was Sammy J's '1999'. It told the tale of a teenage boy and the way he dealt with his bully, all accompanied by some truly humerous songs. I think it's very hard not to like Sammy's comedy.

There was a quick dash up the stairs of the Underbelly to see Heath McIvor's 'Randy's Postcards From Purgatory'. Although I enjoyed Randy's tales (through Heath's excellent puppetry skills) the room seemed dead and lifeless.

After making a quick pitstop at the flat for some nutrience, I headed to the Guilded Ballon for Axis Of Awesome. The onstage banter between Benny, Lee and Jordan was so, so funny. My favourite song was 4 Chords, love it!

The last show of the evening was 'Purple Ronnie's Stand-up Poetry Club' at the Udderbelly with Luke Wright, Phil Jupitus and Dockers MC. It was a very cool gig but I just needed my bed and started to a get a little fed-up towards the end.

Edinburgh Fringe. Day 5.

I think I may have fallen asleep before my head hit the pillow but I was up at a reasonable hour (through excitement I think) and managed to make it to The Early Edition. Alongside Marcus Bridgestoke and Andre Vincent were Carrie Quinlan and Phil Jupitus. I wish I could start every day with a show like this. I love the way they don't care about offending or trying to be politically correct.

Next up was Party which I had been looking forward to for ages. It was written and stared Tom Basden (as well as Tim Key) so I was bound to enjoy it, turns out I enjoyed it a lot (surprise!). Long story short it was about a group of youths starting a political party and having to work out policies, roles, names etc. Tim Key's character Duncan stole the show; a stunning performance.

We'd caught wind that Adam Hills and Jason Byrne were doing Comedy Club 4 Kids and figured this was an oppurtunity we couldn't pass up. The show was hosted by Tiernan Douieb and also featured David O'Doherty and it proved very, very funny (especially for my friends and I who are children at heart).

We got a quick bite to eat before heading back to The Bongo Club for Simon Amstell; a show I found somewhat disappointing. I had seen a couple of previews and I just seemed to enjoy those shows so much more, I felt he kept losing his way and only half-finishing his jokes. I think this was largely due to the fact that he contributed so much time and effort at The 24 Hour Show.

The next show of the day was Camille O'Sullivan's 'Dark Angel' at Assembly Hall. Camille seemed very calm and didn't really show much of her quirky side during this performance. Her stunning voice filled every inch of the very large and beautiful venue. My favourite songs were 5 Years and These Shoes.

My brain was obviously not function properly when I thought it would be a great idea to have several glasses of wine when I got back to the flat and go out (again!) to catch Fordy's Lock-in. I didn't know any of the comedians except for Carl Donnelly (who just sat at the bar on-stage and sipped his beer) and I spent the entire show extremely bored. The wine gave me an excuse to speak my mind and I did quite a bit of complaining.

After the show we went upstairs to catch Brendan Burns headlining Just The Tonic. I hadn't been all that impressed with Mr. Burns in the past as I found his comedy very aggressive. However after his great contribution the previous day, my views seemed to change and I thouroughly enjoyed his set.

Edinburgh Fringe. Day 4.

The 24 Hour Show was, by far, the best 24 hours of my life. It's so sad to think that this was Mark Watson's last one (however i'm hopeful that he'll do something equally awesome for future Fringe Festival's).

The show started 20 minutes late due to a few technical hitches and so we could celebrate (we ended up celebrating by singing a Christams Carol. I can't even remember how that came about!) every hour, on the hour, we came up with a new time zone which was named New Scottish Time (20 minutes behind British Summer Time).

Tim Minchin sent a video that was played towards the end of the day. In it he said he didn't know what to say because we may have decided that we weren't going to use verbs. He certainly hit the nail on the head in terms of what goes on during these epic shows.

The best way I can descibe the 24 hour show is to draw similarities to Telethon (a comedy Telethon...?). Nothing seemed to be planned, if you were there and you could contribute then the stage was yours. My favourite contributers were Tim Key, David O'Doherty, Andrew McClelland, Chris Cox, Brendan Burns, Simon Amstell, Dan Walmsley and Teirnan Douieb.

My highlights included "What's the New Scottish Time Mr. Wolf", Teirnan Douieb leading us in an electric boogaloo and The Lovely Band singing Creep. The only thing that annoyed me was when Paul Foot showed up late in the day and drew attention to himself by announcing that he'll purposefully leave 5 minutes before the end.

Twitter played a very important role in the day with tweets being sent out every few minutes which allowed people at home, work etc to join in on the fun. We got lots of re-tweets and feedback about New Scottish Time; very amusing.