14th July 2010

I was in foul mood all day. Work was duller than a Leona Lewis interview, I was unhappy with how I'd gone down at my gig the night before and the weather seemed to be reflecting my mood in a display of pathetic fallacy that Thomas Hardy would've baulked at.

In general I would describe myself as pretty neutral when it comes to emotions, I don't really have sweeping highs or crushing lows, I more just trundle along in an ambivalent haze. So when I am in a mood I find the whole experience a little disturbing. Equally when I'm overly happy I am always worried that I'm forgetting something truly heinous that should be bringing me down.

Does this make me a pessimist? I don't know. Nor do I care. That's the ambivalence again. I think to much is made of people who think the glass is half full as opposed to people who think the glass is half empty. Is it not enough to just know it's half. It's exactly at the midpoint. It has the potential to be added to and the potential to be drained. At least when it's at the half way mark a bit of buffetting is unlikely to spill it. I think I'm stretching the metaphor somewhat here.

But just to push it further surely it depends what the glass is half full of as to determine whether the person is an optimist or just an idiot. For example someone who thinks the glass is half full of gin is clearly a naturally happy chap, but what if it's half full of shit? Or worse Fosters? Well if you're happy about that then you're clearly a mentalist and only one short step from lining you bicycle helmet with tin foil and speaking to strangers on the bus.

13th July 2010

Tonight was another Comedy at the Royal Standard, I am as yet undecided as to whether I enjoy this night or not. As the compere (MC? I never know which to use) the focus isn’t on me I know but I can’t help feeling that the audience at the Standard couldn’t give a damn about my attempts at witticisms whereas the audience at Laughter Lines tends to accept me as another comedian rather than that bloke who drinks here who run the comedy night.

I was told after the gig that this was the strongest line up so far. This may or may not be true. Comedy gigs are like psychics, it’s about making the audience notice the ‘hits’ and ignore the misses. It helped that the first act on didn’t suck and then the second guy stormed it. That gives a little leeway for the rest of the acts. The rest of the first half was reasonable if never amazing. The second half started strongly but then audience apathy kicked in by the end so it petered out somewhat.

I wanted to use my own nights to get more comfortable with an audience and to work on new material but I’m not sure if it’s really working. I come up with new material each month but I never get the opportunity to expand it and develop it so I now have a load of mediocre material and very little gold. And I’m in desperate need of some gold. I need to start making the step up from someone who goes down well at gigs without being the stand out performer to always being one of the guys the audience always remembers.

This all sounds like I’m in the midst of a crisis of confidence and quite frankly I am. I’m struggling to find the humour in anything right now. It’s like living in a perpetual episode of My Family.