I really wish I had a dream

Hello folks.

Just a quick post to say I've moved my blog so I won't be posting here anymore.

The new blog can be found at http://misswizsblog.blogspot.com/

Hope to see some of you there!

Much love,

Sarah

So, errm, yeah. It wasn't that bad. I actually enjoyed teaching on my own. I even dealt with bottom set, unruly second years today and did pretty well at it if I say so myself! I do need to improve my evening time management though. I can't cope on six hours sleep a night for very long.

That's all. Panic over. Stand down troops. As you were.

(P.S Massive thanks to everyone on Twitter who, despite half of them having never met me, were wonderfully supportive after my last blog)

I've just realised I'm fucking terrified. This has been brought on by the fact that I have to do my first solo teaching tomorrow. They're only 12 year olds but they can bit pretty scary. I think mostly I'm scared in case I'm no good at it. It's a long time since I properly used my French and I'm scared of making mistakes. I'm not used to not being good at stuff; when I was at school I was pretty much good at everything. I got less good at stuff as I progressed in my education but no-one read my university essays except me and my tutor so it didn't really matter that much. If I fuck this up there will be an actual teacher and 30 kids there to witness my failure.

On top of this I've got so much work to do for my course and I don't really know where to start. Well, that's not quite true; I'm going to start with a list just as soon as I've finished writing this. And I bought some new stationery today, surely that will help?

Mostly, I'm just fucking terrified that I've made a huge mistake in embarking on this teaching lark in the first place. I've never made a serious career decision before. I've pretty much just drifted along into whatever seemed the easiest at the time. And now I've given up a (admittedly boring, and not very well paid) job, my Dad has invested a chunk of his savings in my life (well, he's been doing that my whole life), and I'm scared that I've committed to do something for the rest of my life that I'm not even sure I want to do for the next six weeks.

I'm fairly sure this is just pre-show nerves as it were and once I actually start doing it I'll be OK. This isn't really like me. I usually give the impression of being sure of myself and in control but just now I don't feel like that at all. One of the reasons I left my old job in the holiday industry three years ago was because I often felt an underlying sense of impending doom. And now that feeling is back and I don't like it one tiny bit.

I've been so busy lately, and been having so much fun enjoying comedy adventures that I think I'd just pushed all this stuff down in the hope it would go away. And now there's no comedy to distract me it's coming bubbling back to the surface like those hot mud pool things that sort of burp and splutter their sulphurous gases out into the open.

Sorry. This is all a bit depressing. I hope for some improvement soon.

The weekend of Tim Minchin shows that I blogged about the other day was the middle weekend of my two week induction placement in school – the very first school experience of my teacher training course. Going away for the whole weekend probably wasn't the best idea but it was worth it. I was only observing classes in school, although I did do a little bit of teaching. And so far so good; I'm still pretty sure I've made the right decision to do this. I'm about to start a six week placement, back at the same school, and this time I'll actually be planning and teaching lessons so I hope I survive!

Anyway, after the Minchin shows in High Wycombe and Birmingham I didn't have too long to wait before I got to see the show again. Two weeks later on 8^th October Tim played the first of his Scottish dates in Perth at the recently built Concert Hall. From what Tim has said these new venues, although great for the audience and very impressive to look at, are quite difficult to play as all the audience noise and applause is sucked away and doesn't make it to the stage. The show in Perth was brilliant, despite an audience who did seem a little slow on the uptake at times. I had another front row seat which is great, apart from getting completely spotlit during If I Didn't Have You and Storm when Tim is lit from behind. I think my favourite part of this show was the encore – there were lots of shouts from the audience for some old favourites and Tim treated to quite a few intros before settling on White Wine in the Sun. My shout for You Grew On Me went ignored, although when I complained that 'it's only just October' I earned myself the finger from Tim and the assertion that it was OK to play a song about Christmas because 'there are big socks in the shops'! I also met another couple of Angry(Feet) twitterers at the Perth gig – Helen (@glamlovinkitty) and Adam (@sturmwulfe) – which is always nice. I got a chance to have a quick word with Tim after the show too, where I gave him a birthday card which I had seen and couldn't resist because of the quote on the front – 'My opinions may change the older I get, but not the fact that I am right'. Pretty spot on I thought! We also had a bit of a discussion about whether or not Horton actually did hear a Who – provoked by my t-shirt, one of several I own with Minchin quotes on them.

The day after the Perth show came the show I had most been looking forward to in the whole tour. Tim was coming to The Alhambra in Dunfermline – not only my home town but the theatre where I volunteer as a steward – which meant I managed to get access to the theatre all day. Until the theatre manager decided I wasn't allowed due to Health and Safety issues, I helped unload all the lights and set from the truck and get everything set up on the stage. It was all very cool, and Tim's crew were all lovely. It must be a bit of a nightmare for them turning up at a different venue every day, never quite sure if everything they need will be there or not. Tim showed up with John, his tour manager, late afternoon and I was very excited to be able to witness some sound checking and warming up. I think the most surreal part of the day for me had to be actually scrubbing the ground at Tim's feet!! There had been a show called 'Vampire's Rock' in the theatre a few days before and there was still some fake blood on the stage which wouldn't come off with mopping so while Tim stood at the mic singing a little bit of If I Didn't Have You, I cleaned up the fake blood – surely not an experience that every Tim Minchin fan gets to have?!

The show itself was awesome as ever, apart from a ridiculous number of people with conveniently weak bladders getting up and down throughout the show (Tim had stopped and waited for a boy who got up and walked right across the front of the audience causing much hilarity, but unfortunately encouraging a lot of copy-cat wee-ers). Shell had come up for the show (and the Edinburgh and Glasgow shows which followed) so we went out for a drink afterwards as we weren't sure whether Tim would come out or not (due to the presence of the legendary Karen Coren) and the fact that it was pissing with rain. The whole day was certainly a brilliant experience and one I felt lucky to have.

The third, and last, of the Scottish dates that was going to was in Edinburgh the following day. And it brought another visitor – Kate (@kateweb) came up on the train and after meeting her at the station we headed to a pub next to the very impressive Usher Hall. Before the gig we met up with Shell again, and also Helen and Adam who were back for a second dose of Tim. The venue was particularly impressive in Edinburgh – a big, round, concert hall which has recently been refurbished. Again it was great from an audience perspective (Kate and I had front row seats again) but from what Tim said after it was another venue where he felt a bit detached from the audience reaction. We hung around after the show and got a chance to have a chat with Tim again which was pretty cool – I do wonder if he ever gets fed up of us waiting after shows and wishes we would just leave him alone. If he does then he certainly hides it very well, for which I am grateful!

When tickets for the Scottish shows went on sale I convinced myself that three shows in a row was plenty and didn't get a ticket for the Glasgow show. After the Edinburgh show though, and knowing that the others were all going to the Glasgow show I changed my mind! Unfortunately for me the show was sold out and despite my best efforts I couldn't get my hands on a ticket. Still, I only had a three week wait before seeing the show again. On the 23^rd and 24^th October I went to two out the three sold out shows at the Hammersmith Apollo – the second of which was being recorded for a DVD. But before that I had plenty of other excitement planned – and that deserves a post of its own so for now I'll leave this here.

One of my new favourite things is the Precious Little Podcast in which Michael Legge and James Hingley ramble about, well, precious little for an hour or so. (Do you see what they did there?) They also refer to me as a drunk quite regularly.

So anyway, my other new favourite thing is playing the ukulele, which I've been doing for about 4 or 5 weeks now. Inspired by Michael's ukulele 'playing' during the podcasts, and the wonderful ukulele theme tune written for them by Ian from The Re-entrants, I decided the best way to combine my two new favourite things would be to write a jingle. Of course, what else could I do?

In the early podcasts (there have only been 7 full length ones so far) Michael invented a game which basically just involved shouting really loudly and repeating Michael whenever he called someone a cunt. And it is to this game (played with much enthusiasm by Nic (@nwoolhouseuk) on Twitter) that my jingle relates. I did send a crap version of the audio to James and Michael, and they did say they would play it but they seem to have forgotten so I decided I should record it here for posterity - and also I just remembered my netbook has a webcam. The audio seems to be out of sync with the visual but frankly, I can't be arsed trying to fix it.

Enjoy.

I know, I know - it's been ages since I last wrote a blog. And it's not because I've had nothing to write, more that I've had too much excitement and I don't really know where to start!

On the 25th September I saw my first shows of the current Tim Minchin Ready For This? tour. I started writing a blog post but somehow got distracted and never really finished it but it took ages so I'm going to put it here now.....

This weekend it was finally time for my first show of Tim Minchin's current 'Ready For This?' tour. It was way back in March when I started planning the trip - originally I was going to see four shows; Cambridge, High Wycombe, Birmingham and Coventry. Although they might seem like a fairly random collection of towns/cities they were selected in order that I could meet up with my fellow Minchin fans, and Twitterers, Liza (@wickedlibrarian) and Shannon (@MonaSmith) who were coming over from America (Illinois and LA respectively) to see Tim on tour. So, Liza and I booked show tickets, hotels and car hire for the trip....then I decided to pursue my, slightly last minute, plan to do teacher training. And it turned out the  mini-tour fell on the middle weekend of my first two week school placement. If I believed in fate or karma I might think that I'd done something wrong, but I don't so it was just an unfortunate co-incidence which meant I definitely wouldn't make the Thursday night Cambridge show, and after a quick flight check it was clear I wouldn't be able to get home after the Sunday night Coventry show so that was ruled out too. Which left trying to get to High Wycombe from Scotland in time for the show after a full day at school. Easier said than done as it turned out. The best I could do was book a 18.15 flight and hope that I made it in time for the second half of the show.

With all the other things going on at the moment, the weekend kind of crept up on me and I hadn't really had a chance to get excited but sitting at Edinburgh Airport on Friday night I couldn't wait to get there. The journey was pretty uneventful despite a series of short but frustrating delays; the flight was 10 minutes late, I was sat towards the back of the plane and had to wait for everyone in front of me to get off first, the car hire guy seemed unable to use a keyboard, and then when I finally thought I was well on my way I hit stationary traffic on the M25. I eventually made it to High Wycombe and when I drove past the theatre to the car park I could see the audience in the foyer – meaning I must have made it in time for the second half.....and then I ended up in the very last space in the multi-story, on the ninth level!! I finally made it into the auditorium just in time for the first song of the second half; Bears Don't Dig on Dancing. I hung around at the back until the song was finished then made my way to my seat on the second row (accidentally sitting in the 'bear's' seat in the process as he was coming down from the stage and I was actually two seats further along).

It was really quite weird seeing just the second half of the show. I missed a couple of my favourite songs which are in the first half but I did get to see Storm which was brilliant as ever. Tim's acting seems to have developed so much since the last time I saw it – and a very funny Scooby Doo accent has also made its way in! Darkside was bloody fantastic, the piano solo now is truly epic (although a callback to a joke involving Greensleeves from the first half didn't make any sense to me). What was noticeable, having not seen the first half is that Tim does very little talking in the second half of the show – apart from the nine minutes of Storm that is. I was very pleased at the inclusion of If You Really Loved Me in this show, it's always exciting for me to see a Tim song that I haven't seen live before. Also, it seems on this tour that Tim is more open to requests for his encore (although I would guess he already has in mind what he's going to play). We were treated to Not Perfect in High Wycombe. Now I'm not a crier but this song very nearly brought a tear to my eye. And I love that Tim is currently 33 and 12 months old. I know he has to sing it that way because 34 years old doesn't scan properly (and actually he's not 34 until next week) but it still makes me giggle!

After the show I finally got to speak to Liza which was another slightly bizarre experience. Not that Liza is in anyway odd (well maybe just a little bit!) but it's weird meeting someone in real life and hearing the speak for the first time when you've 'spoken' to them a lot online before. It was also lovely to see Linzy, Shell, Emii and Simone again – having last seen them in Edinburgh. There was a small crowd at the stage door waiting for Tim to come out. Now he's hit the big time and is playing much bigger venues he doesn't appear to be doing official after show signings. Not that I blame him, he'd be there forever! The patient and dedicated few (well few tens) of people who made it to the stage door were rewarded with Mr Minchin's presence. We hung out round the corner until he was done and managed to catch him for a quick chat before he headed home. I've not seen Tim since Dublin in June but it was lovely that he remembered me (even if he did accidentally call me the wrong name – which he apologised for the following night).

After retrieving my car from the top story of the car park I headed to the hotel round the corner where I was staying with Liza (Shell and Linzy were staying there too). Then after a couple of hours of chat and cold pizza we finally went to bed, where me and Liza proceeded to lie awake in the dark chatting for another hour and a half. It's so nice when someone you've only communicated with via the internet turns out to be lovely in real life too!

The next morning after breakfast in the hotel and a quick wander round High Wycombe (which is a weird combination of pretty market town and crappy shops) with Liza we got in the car for the drive up to Birmingham. We had a very pleasant couple of hours in the car talking about religion and skepticism (and of course Mr Minchin!) - having mostly spoken to Liza on Twitter up until then it was great to have a conversation in more than 140 character bursts!

We managed to find the Travelodge relatively easily and after checking in went to the pub next door for tuna melt sandwiches and Liza's first experience of pear cider. I was really looking forward to seeing the full Tim show that evening so the afternoon seemed to take forever while we waited to go to the show. We walked to the venue an hour or so before the show was due to start where we met up with Shell again, along with Misha (@howlieT) and finally we got to meet Shannon and her husband Jeremy, who had come over from LA. We also saw Tim loitering outside the venue with his crew and later found out it was because they had managed to set the fire alarm off with the smoke machine during the technical rehearsal!

After a quick drink we found our seats ready for the show to start. My original ticket was for the 6^th row but Liza wanted to have a different perspective of the show so swapped me for a front row seat. The show was brilliant. It's certainly stepped up a notch on the rock star scale since last year's tour. After the show we hung out again and after the really quite big crowd (which had a large proportion of squealy girls) had finally disappeared we got another chance to talk to Tim (when he made a point of getting my name right!). Me, Liza, Shell, Shannon and Mr Shannon then headed to the pub for some post-show discussion and more cider drinking which was all pretty lovely. It turns out Liza really doesn't need much cider to turn into a lovely, giggly drunk! Eventually me and Liza headed back to our hotel where we once again continued to chat into the night.

The next day, after a bit of a wander round Birmingham and some lunch we drove over to the concrete jungle Coventry. We eventually found the Travelodge which was somewhat inexplicably in the middle of a shopping centre and it wasn't long until Nic (@nwoolhouseuk - who you may remember from my Edinburgh blogs) turned up to take over room mate duties from me. When the girls all headed off to the Coventry show I sadly had to drive back to the airport for my flight home.

All in all it was a great weekend and it was brilliant to finally meet Liza and Shannon. I can't wait now until I get the chance to go and visit them on their home territory in the US. They are all part of my cunning plan to collect friends around the world so I can go travelling on the cheap - but shush, I haven't told them yet!!

So with the first Tim Minchin weekend over I went back for another week at school - I was mostly observing classes but did do a little bit of teaching too. And now, four weeks later, I'm about to go back to the same school for another six weeks and my first chance to be a 'real' teacher. I really just hope it is everything I expect and wanted, and I don't discover I made the wrong decision in going for this.

I think this will do for one post - I shall fill in the blanks from the intervening 4 weeks (which included another five Tim shows!) in another post.

You probably won't even remember this but in one of my Edinburgh blogs I mentioned that I had met Paul Sinha a few times and he had come across as a bit of a dick. It's very easy when writing a blog to forget that you are writing about real people and were they to read your opinion it may upset or offend them.

Today I received a very nice message from Paul himself on Facebook. I'm not going to go into what he said but I feel I can now safely say that he clearly isn't a dick and that Edinburgh tiredness/drunkeness and perhaps my own slight discomfort at being in a performers bar where I wasn't sure I really had the right to be led me to jump to (the incorrect) conclusion rather to quickly.

I'm sure very few people have read the previous blog, or would take any notice of my opinion anyway but in any case I hope Paul accepts this apology and that my previous comments can be struck from the record.

So for the second time in the 24 hours I left the action, this time though for something much more exciting. We got a few odd looks as we walked, all in our sunglasses, through the Pleasance Courtyard behind Adam Hills. As we got out on to the street we realised we wouldn't all fit in one taxi so The Entourage got into the first taxi (with £20 provided by Adam) while Mr Hills got into the taxi behind us. On the short drive over to The Assembly Rooms @ George Street we all introduced ourselves - there was me, obviously, then Australian Karena (@Queena77 who I'd already met when she came to Dublin with Simone in July), Aoife (@sweetoblivion26) from Ireland (who it turns out is a friend of fellow Feeter/Tweeter @annawaits) and finally twins Helen (@iamanicelady) and Rachel (@pandorapink). I was wearing one of my Tim Minchin inspired t-shirts (the 'we're just fucking monkeys in shoes' one) which someone commented on and then we spent the rest of the journey talking about how we were all really big Tim fans and none of actually knew that much about Adam! We did tell Adam this when we got to the Assembly Rooms too, and he was pretty tickled about it!

We then followed Adam (still wearing sunglasses despite the dullness of the day) to Starbucks for him to get his pre-show coffee and fruit. At this point we were still getting a few bemused looks but this is Edinburgh so not much surprises people. After the pit stop we made our way into the venue and while walking through the nearly deserted lobby one of the venue staff called out to Adam 'Is this your entourage?'....well, now that you mention it! Adam seemed really pleased that someone had noticed so we got her to take a quick picture which I could Twitpic back to everyone else still at the 24 Hour Show. It was too early to go backstage so we had a quick drink and some much needed potato wedges and dips and stuff, all courtesy of Mr Hills - he really knows how to look after an entourage. We then got to go backstage and when we walked into the dressing room there was Frank Skinner whose show was on before Adam's! Frank is another comedian who is shorter than I thought he would be. Still he seemed very nice and genuinely interested in what we had been up to. Adam made a valiant attempt to convince Frank that he should come down to the 24 Hour Show later but it didn't seem that likely that he would.

At this point Adam was a bit confused about what he was actually going to do with us. The show was a sell out so we couldn't watch from the audience but he didn't want us to be missing out on the 24 Hour action just to sit in the dressing room while he did his show...so after checking with us that we didn't mind he said he would bring us on stage and we could sit and watch the show from there!! It was all very exciting, but having been awake for about 31 hours at this point I didn't have enough energy to be nervous. Or the nervous adrenaline was perhaps enough to bring me up to normal energy levels. Anyway, Adam went on stage and did his usual audience banter. There was a young boy in the audience who was only about 11 so Adam got him up on stage for a chat. He then briefly explained to the audience that he had been at Mark Watson's 24 Hour Show (which a few people seemed to have heard of) and about his ambition to have an entourage. Then he brought us on stage and told the young lad that he could borrow us for the duration of the show! We all sat on the stage, one of the twins (sorry ladies, I can't remember which one of you it was) gave his shoulders a quick massage and then someone in the audience had a fan which Adam procured and I used it to fan him down. If it had been anyone else's show then I don't know if they would have got away with it but Adam has such goodwill from his audience that I think they would let him get away with anything! We then stayed on the stage for the duration of the show, which was really good. It was quite bizarre at times when Adam, despite having an audience of 600 paying customers in front of him, turned and performed some of the show just to us! I kind of forgot I was on stage after a while because I was so engrossed by the show. I'm sure no-one was really looking at us anyway, but I did manage to catch myself just before I picked my nose!! Just before the end of the show we went off the stage and Adam finished off his set. Apparently Irish comedian Des Bishop (who we had seen in the bar earlier and whose show I had really enjoyed) always hands out flyers for his show to Adam's audience on their way out so Adam told everyone to ask him where his entourage was. When we saw him afterwards it turned out lots of them did - I think he really was quite jealous!

After his show Adam usually stays to sign tickets and t-shirts and the like so we all went and stood behind the desk with him while he did what he needed to do. I'm a little bit ashamed to say I may have ruined a few people's photos of them and Adam by deliberately getting in the back of the shot and pouting! Adam, generous as ever, then decided we should all have one of his t-shirts and as the money from the sale goes to charity he actually had to pay for them all too! So I now am the proud owner of a one of a kind signed 'Entourage Member' t-shirt. After nearly 3 hours away, we got back in a taxi to head back and join the fun. I had a quick check on the Twitter feed on the way back, and as much fun as we'd had I was still a bit gutted to have missed the goings on which had included; Ali McGregor and a oom-pah band, a song from Tom Basden, Tiernan spreading the funk and leading the audience in an Electric Boogaloo, a video message and song from Tim Minchin, Brendon Burns wanting to crowd surf, a performance from a Stone Roses tribute band (although we didn't miss much there apparently), the arrival of the other Mark Watson that Mark had spoken to earlier, some more mind-fuckery from Chris Cox, a presentation from the people who had gone with Adam Hills to Kirkcaldy that morning, and of course a few more Christmas songs too!

When we arrived back the audience were in the middle of singing with great gusto The Proclaimers' '500 Miles' so we waited until they'd finished before being introduced on to the stage by Burnsy. We then had another 5 minutes of fame while Adam relayed what we had been up to then it was back into the audience to try and catch up on what had been going on.

It turned out that while we'd been gone a plan had been concocted to set Simon Amstell up on a blind date by actually recreating the fantastic Cilla Black fronted Blind Date. So three contestants were found and while we all sang the Blind Date theme tune a make shift screen was rigged on stage using some mic stands and the ever useful slanket. To be honest none of the 'contestants' looked like they would be the type Simon would go for (he hadn't seen them although I'm not sure how they managed that) but he very gamely played along with his three questions - Question 1: I really like the Fringe festival, if you were one what sort of stuff would be in it? Question 2: I like thin and attractive men; are you? and Question 3: I can't run very fast; can you? The boys all did a great job at answering and then Tiernan did a spookily accurate impression of 'Our Graham' in summing up their responses. I'm sure Amstell didn't even speak to the 'winner' after they got off the stage let alone go on a date but it entertained us for a good half an hour. There had been a live video stream of the show since the move to the final venue but the plug was pulled for Blind Date (presumably for fear that embarrassing footage of Amstell might show up on YouTube) but to be fair good on him for playing along at all. After the excitement of Blind Date we celebrated the end of hour 22 with O Holy Night. There really wasn't long to go...

I had had a pear cider (Mark Watson's subliminal influence perhaps?) when we were away with Hillsy and when we got back I had decided that as there wasn't long until the end, and I was still feeling remarkably alert, that to carry on drinking would be a good idea. I only had about four pints altogether but with that amount of sleep deprivation and lack of real food they certainly made me even giddier than I would have been anyway.

With only two hours to go thinks took a turn for the slightly surreal - one of Mark's ambitions that had been revealed earlier in the day was his desire to unicycle so a lot of requests had gone out around Edinburgh for a unicyclist to come down and help Mark fulfil his wish. A street performer man was duly found and he turned up with with all the necessary equipment. You may be thinking that this doesn't sound particularly weird but when the guy got on stage he clearly had no idea what was going on or really why he was there so he started trying to do his street act for us....which started with him stripping down to his underpants!!! Anyway, after a quick demonstration he did manage to get Mark up on the unicycle - although he was being held up by about four other people. After he got off the bike, the guy proceeded to pick a, by this point pretty terrified looking, Mark up on his shoulders. We never actually found out what he was planning on doing as very sensibly producer Corry quickly stepped in to get him down and the odd unicycling man was hussled off stage. Luckily Tim Key chose this time to return and so was on hand to lighten the mood after the randomness.

We never did manage to get U2 to come down but in a final last ditch attempt at contacting famous people Hills volunteered to call the most famous person in his phone, who turned out to be Guy Pratt from Pink Floyd. Adam had a quick chat on speaker phone and we all shouted our hellos. It wasn't quite Bono in our midst but still pretty cool. The Australians then sang a carol we'd never heard of, accompanied by Ali McGregor on the 'Rolf Harris Stylophone', to take us into the final hour. Everyone settled down as we watched videos from 24 Hour Shows past. I'm not much of a crier under normal circumstances but watching footage from the first 24 Hour Show in 2005 brought a lump to my throat. I'd had such an amazing day, it felt so special to be a part of what had turned into a real community over the last 24 hours, and I was mostly just sad that I'd only just discovered it when (for now at least) there are no plans ever to do it again. Lots of people thanked Mark (and Corry) for making the show happen. Thanks also came from 'the big three'; three girls who, aged just 17, had been at the first 24 Hour Show and had been to every one since, including the two in Australia. Mark also took the time to thank all the people who had been involved over the 24 hours before, in what is apparently 24 Hour Show tradition, Ali McGregor took to the stage with her omnichord, where she was joined by 'The Lovely Band'; Martin White on accordion, James Sherwood on keys, Amy Butterworth on violin (who had been with us all day I think and done an amazing job of playing almost every carol). Then followed an absolutely amazing version of Radiohead's Creep and I'd be surprised if there was a dry eye in the house.

Mark then invited anyone who had been involved in the show (which by rights should have been pretty much everyone in the building) up on to the stage as we counted down to the end of the 24 Hours at 1am New Scottish Time (which was actually 1.20am BST). I sneaked up onto the back of the stage with fellow entourage member Aoife and then with the best version of Do They Know It's Christmas I've ever heard, it was all over. There were lots of hugs then the shell-shocked audience and performers made our way out into the night. After hanging around outside for a bit and saying some goodbyes I headed off with Kate (@kateweb) who was very generously letting me stay on her sofa for the night. Despite having been awake for almost 36 hours by now we were still full of adrenaline and not ready to sleep so we headed to the Gilded Balloon outside bar for a couple of quiet drinks. It wasn't that warm but after being inside pretty much non-stop in a room full of nearly 200 people that hadn't washed in over 24 hours it was lovely just to get some air! We then strolled back to Kate's flat and after I think a full 38 hours awake I finally went to sleep about 4am.

So there we are - my record of Mark Watson's Last Ever 24 Hour Show is finally finished. I'm sure I've missed bits out but it's as complete as it's ever going to get (and again thanks to Linzy (@angryfeet for doing a brilliant job of the @watson24hour tweeting for without it I wouldn't have remembered half of this). I can't really say any more than that 24 hours was without a doubt the absolute highlight of my Edinburgh Fringe experience and one I'm not going to forget in a hurry. I just hope that one day Mr Watson changes his mind and lets us do it all over again!

Right, where was I? Oh yeah, I'd just got back from Glasgow with coffee for Mark - I'm not sure what was happening when I came back in but someone noticed me and everyone gave me a cheer and round of applause for being the first person to leave the audience and come back. I had just had an experience on the train that had restored my faith in the kindness of people so after checking it was OK with Mark I took the mic and took to the stage to tell everyone about the lovely ticket inspector on the train back to Edinburgh who didn't make me buy a new ticket even though I had lost mine. It appeared Mark had been learning to play jingles on the piano whilst I was gone so he gave me a bit of musical accompaniment too. As I said before, I'm a big show off really so I loved getting my (second) 5 minutes of fame on the stage.

There then followed some randomness as Mark started throwing Babybel into the audience in a newly invented game of 'Cheese or Truth' - if you didn't catch the cheese then you had to tell us a true fact about yourself. At this point Mark also faced one of his fears by touching the cheese (how you can be scared of touching cheese I really don't know!). Mark also managed to get another Mark Watson on the phone (I think meeting other Mark Watsons had come up as a challenge while I was away) and as he lived quite nearby he promised to come down later on. Hour ten passed around this time but I don't have a record of what Christmas song we sung on that one. We also received an update that Adam Hills had arrived in Kirkcaldy and was doing his best to spread the word about New Scottish Time. He had taken a couple of audience members with him to campaign and it turned out one of them was a local councillor in London and as such she even managed to get into Gordon Brown's office to leave him a message about NST (Kirkcaldy is the PM's constituency and he'd actually been there earlier in the morning - now that would have been a coup!).

The rest of Edinburgh seemed to be waking up around this time (it was about 12.30pm) and as more audience members went off to play another game of Get a Thing we got an update from Matthew Crosby (remember him?) who was now actually on his cinema date; she had turned up anyway. Brendon Burns also returned with his own entrance/exit music (I'm a Pirate from the Pirates of The Caribbean soundtrack) which he insisted was paid every time he came into the room, and that was a lot of times. It was very funny though and just what we needed to liven us up. Around this time our friend Tiernan Douieb arrived (and brought me more Starbucks tea - thanks T!). Chris Cox also arrived ready for some mind-fiddling a bit later.

I'm not quite sure how (I think I might have been on one of many loo breaks) but for some reason Tiernan decided to see if he could make himself small enough to fit under the Rhod Gilbert poster which had been brought back during the first game of Get a Thing. Now, I may have mentioned before, but Tiernan isn't very big to begin with so he managed to get under the poster without too much trouble. From there, the obvious progression was that Tiernan should actually become the show pet and stay in his little hidey hole under the poster - and he stayed there for a really long time! He was occasionally thrown sustenance in the form of Kinder Eggs (which did nothing for his diabetic blood sugar levels) and various other bits of entertainment. While Tiernan stayed hidden away The Idiots of Ants boys came and entertained us with a song which I think was something to do with no-one wanting to go out with Brendon Burns - suitably entertaining anyway.

We had made it half way through our 24 hour marathon (I'm not sure where

hour 11 had gone) and marked the occasion with The Twelve Days of Christmas - but only one full run from 12 to 1 as no-one could be arsed singing the whole thing! So with 12 hours down and 12 to go Chris Cox took to the stage to fiddle with Mark Watson's mind - and there's a sentence I don't write every day. Mark seemed ridiculously excited to be subjected to the magic of the Cox and after a trick I'd seen Chris do before where he managed to work out a word that Mark had read at random from a book, he then did a trick to work out which card Mark had picked from a deck. Mark could answer all of Chris' questions either truthfully or untruthfully in an attempt to deceive him but with his talent for persuasion and reading body language he managed to get the correct card (and Chris even explained what he was looking for and basically how he was doing it but it was still really cool, and very impressive!). Now both Chris and Mark are both rather on the weedy side to say the least and it turned out neither of them had ever been in a fight, so Brendon Burns stepped up and offered them the chance to try and punch him as hard as they could, he even gave them instructions. The results were hilariously pathetic, even when Mark took a run up!!

All through the previous 12 hours several people had been working hard to get some actual really famous people to come down to the show. They were still working on getting U2 (who were gigging in Glasgow that night), it was pretty amazing the number of people who had vague connections to Bono and the band. It seems that Six Degrees of Separation thing is true after all. Another suggestion was The Proclaimers, and we were still holding out the, slightly more realistic, hope of Lionel Blair - he was in Edinburgh after all. In the midst of this Mark did manage to get Lauren Laverne on the phone, she had been in Edinburgh earlier in the week but wasn't there any more so a phone call had to do. Also, our pet Tiernan had still been under the poster all this time but he had to go and actually do his own show. Although he wasn't let off that easily, seeing as he was a pet Chris Cox had to walk him out of the building (or at least out of our sight) on all fours!

Over the next hour or so we had a visit from Marisa, an actual masseuse who took on the challenge of speed massage on stage for anyone who wanted one - and I can confirm it was amazing. Just what I needed after sitting on a stool for 14 hours, although I could have done with about 10 times as long in the massage chair. There was also another game of Get a Thing, where the boys returned with some Disney Princesses from Princess Cabaret who not only one them the game but also entertained us with some parodies of Disney songs which were somewhat more lewd than the originals. Hour 14 passed with God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen and Adam Hills returned with pizza for all, well pizza for most at least - I was too slow to get any unfortunately.

After 14 and a half hours in the Ace Dome (and it really smelt like we'd been in there that long too) we had to pack up our things and prepare to head over to the Pleasance Courtyard. We walked over en masse, and a crowd of over 100 people all following Mark Watson through the streets of Edinburgh certainly caused a few concerned stares! We were meant to be going into the Cabaret Bar but as it wasn't ready when we arrived we set up temporary camp in the Pleasance Beyond. We were only going to be there half an hour or so and so decided to fill the time with a game of 'What's the (New Scottish) Time, Mr Wolf?' which I may or may not have won depending on whether or not I was actually disqualified for cheating! Matthew Crosby also came back and although his actual girlfriend had censored him from discussing her reaction, or the actual date, he did fill us in on the horrific nature of Antichrist. Suffice to say it's not a film I'll be seeing any time soon! We also celebrated the end of hour 15 in the Beyond with We Wish You A Merry Christmas as it was deemed a suitably rousing Christmas song for the slightly flagging crowd.

The next move took us next door into the Cabaret Bar. Somehow, Mark started talking about what sort of clothes he would wear if he was a woman. As it happened he would wear clothes a bit like those that producer Corry was wearing.....so of course he had to put them on, while Corry just had to hang about wearing a slanket (which had somehow featured in the show while I'd been away in Glasgow). In all honesty, seeing as he was still just wearing jeans and a vest it didn't look that unusual to my sleep deprived brain! Phil Nicol turned up around this time and started insulting us - he said we smelled like a zoo, who'd have thought it? Next to arrive was Andrew Collins who was in town to record his live podcasts with Richard Herring. He had actually just got off the train and come straight to see us, now that's dedication. Although he didn't know he was going to be coming Andrew is always prepared to deliver his 10 minutes of material on the Mitford Sisters (which Herring mercilessly takes the piss out of him for). It really is pretty interesting but an audience that had mostly been awake for over 24 hours at this point probably wasn't ideal. And unfortunately for Andrew, his moment in the spotlight was cut abruptly short by the return of Phil Nicol, this time accompanied by Stephen K Amos, and none other than....Lionel Blair!! This was definitely one of the more surreal moments of the whole show. I was mere feet from the legend that is Lionel while he did a bit of a tap dance for us. I think he was really bemused by the whole thing and he wasn't really sure why he was there but the man is like a parody of himself. Like a larger than life version of Lionel Blair. It really was most strange.

Our special guests left and the mood could have dipped but Simon Amstell chose this moment to come back and entertain us with some potentially libellous (and probably made up) tales about other celebs. Adam Hills also made a return and in a callback to a previous theme advised us that he'd always wanted an entourage, and asked if we could find one to go to his show with him later in the evening. Adam had to go but promised he would return later to collect his entourage to take to his show. As Adam's girlfriend Ali McGregor was on hand she was called on to select the five lovely ladies who would accompany Mr Hills later. Anyone who wanted to be considered made their way up to the stage (me included) where for some reason which proved largely irrelevant we arranged ourselves in height order. Clearly, to be in an entourage you would need to wear sunglasses so any girls without their own sunglasses were quickly eliminated. That whittled numbers down from, I think, 11 to 7 and I was still in the running. Next Ali decided that only those who knew enough about Adam should be allowed in his entourage and asked who his favourite band is. I thought that would be it for me as I didn't have a clue....but luckily neither did anyone else! The next question was which foot is prosthetic (if you didn't know Adam Hills only has one foot!). Now this one I did know - not because I am a massive Adam Hills fan (truth be told, other than a couple of episodes of Spicks and Specks that I had watched because Tim Minchin was on, and what I had seen in the last 18 hours, I knew very little of Adam) but because he had been sat on the stage right in front of me half an hour before and I'd been able to see from his boot which one was the false foot! So the seven were cut down to five and the entourage was complete. Job done Ali then entertained us with an song about pussies (the feline variety) on her omnichord (an instrument of the future, direct from the 1980s) and an AC/DC cover. We also skyped Josie Long around this time - she had been learning Esperato for the duration of the show and gave us a little taster of what she knew. There were so many cool people who couldn't be at the show but still got involved - and that's what Watson's 24 Hour Shows are really all about.

We were now 18 and a half hours into the show and I was feeling surprisingly awake. There was so much happening there wasn't time to be tired. And if you are ever going to attempt anything like this, my best advice would be to take a toothbrush. It really made me feel better. The show would be going on the road again shortly with a final move to George Square but for the entourage it was time to go....Adam came back, we donned our sunglasses and off we went into the night.....

And that's the end of Part 2. The conclusion of events will follow tomorrow in Part 3. Thanks for watching (or rather reading) folks. Stick with me, I'll get there in the end!!   

Clearly I'm rather late in actually writing about Mark Watson's 24 Hour Show which happened at this year's Fringe. In fact the Fringe is now over, and although this only happened two weeks ago it feels like an absolute lifetime! Anyway, I'm going to do my best to create a record of my 24 hours...which was actually all spent at the show, as you'll see...

So, on Monday 17th August I stayed in bed until 2pm to try and stock up on sleep in preparation for the many hours of awakedness that were to follow. I had, in hindsight perhaps rather ill-advisedly, booked to see three shows in the evening leading up to the start of the 24 Hour Show (which was set to start at 1am in the early hours of Tuesday 18th). The shows from Mark Thomas and Jon Richardson were excellent. I wasn't quite as impressed with Geraldine Quinn but that might have been partly due to my anticipation of what was to come later that night. After the last show I grabbed a pizza to try and sustain me through the first few hours and then headed over to the Pleasance Dome to join the other Angry (Feet)ers in the newly formed queue. An hour of queuing and mounting excitement later we were allowed upstairs into the Ace Dome, where the Feeters claimed the entire front row of seats and settled in with our supplies.

The show was due to start at 1am, and then we would celebrate the end of each hour until the 24 were done....but due to a few technical issues getting a laptop, projector and wi-fi working we didn't actually start the show until 1.20am. Which caused the first problem of the evening, and the entertainment for the next hour and a half or so while we decided what to do. Firstly, I should explain, Mark Watson's 24 Hour Show is like no other. Apart from the obvious 24 hour aspect that is. As an audience we were there to do much more than just turn up and watch, in fact we even got an email before the show asking us to bring ideas, props, games, in fact anything we thought might help pass some of the time. There are some people that Mark and his amazing producer Corry Shaw know will be there to do something at some point but there are lots of people (comedians and musicians and the like) who just pop in and out as they can and provide some sort of entertainment when they do.

So after a quick introduction from Mark (with James Sherwood on the piano providing musical accompaniment, and Tim Key at the laptop randomly typing up proceedings to be projected on the big screen) we got to the thorny issue of what to do about the time. Mark still wanted to celebrate the end of every hour of the show but didn't think it would feel right to do it at 20 past each hour. We would still have to do the full 24 hours so if we celebrated on the actual hour we would then have to do an extra 20 minutes at the end...it really was a dilemma. So Mark invited suggestions from the audience and assembled comics. The first suggestion was that we all put our watches back 20 minutes so we would then finish the show at 1am our time. This option was strongly supported by Tim Key from the very beginning. There then followed loads of suggestions (although a lot of them did end up being very similar!), with quite a few of the more bonkers ones coming from Irish comedian David O'Doherty (who was sat right at the back of the room but then just couldn't stay sat down!). Other suggestions included; celebrating on the hour to finish at 1am but then having a 20

minute encore, adjusting the time by a minute every hour, and other variations on these themes. Somewhere along the line David also suggested we celebrate each passing hour by singing a Christmas Carol, which did nothing to help solve the time problem but was quickly adopted with a rousing rendition of Jingle Bells at 2am. During this discussion Australian comedians Brendon Burns, Sammy J and Adam Hills had all arrived and weighed into the debate. Finally, it boiled down to two options; create our own time zone (and much confusion) or do a 20 minute encore at the end of the show. And so, as with all good democracies, it was put to a vote. Pappy's Fun Club member Matthew Crosby stepped up to count the show of hands but as he couldn't manage to count everyone by himself, he recruited three other Matts from the audience to help him! And so, at 2.37am we created our own time zone! Instead of what could have been a problem or an annoyance, the technical problems at the top of the show had already created an hour and a half of entertainment and actually then provided a huge proportion of what went on during the rest of the 24 hours.

Having created a time zone for ourselves, someone decided it would be a good idea if we tried to convince the rest of the country that they were wrong and we were right and the time had actually changed. The campaign started by changing the time zone page on Wikipedia to show New Scottish Time as it had become known. Adam Hills who was going to the press launch for the Kirkcaldy Comedy Festival the next day offered to spread the word that way, and Brendon Burns was going to do his bit during an interview on Galaxy FM in the afternoon. It seems tradition from the previous 24 Hour Shows had it that Sammy J put on as many items of clothing and accessories from audience members (his previous record was 47) and carried out a challenge, so the obvious choice seemed to be to send him to Edinburgh airport early the next morning to advise the newly arrived tourists of the new time zone. What else could he possibly do? But that would have to wait until the first flights started arriving at 6.30am.

With the time issues finally sorted out, and a discussion of which celebrities we wanted to try and get to the show (we came up with U2, Lionel Blair and Ronnie Corbett) Mark started to tell us about one of his other ideas for the show - that he, and anyone else who fancied, could try and achieve any lifelong ambitions they held. (At some point here we celebrated the end of the second hour with We Three Kings). It wasn't really a lifelong ambition but Matthew Crosby told us he wanted to find someone to go on a date with him to see the film Antichrist, because his actual girlfriend wouldn't go with him! A quick game of Guess Who followed after it was decided the most suitable date would be the audience member who looked most like Matt. Being a glasses wearer I was in with a chance but missed out when I didn't share the same favourite author as Matt. A little later on in proceedings Matt phoned (and woke up) his girlfriend live from the stage to check it was OK with her that he went on a date with someone else. I don't think she was particularly impressed, either by the time or concept!

Meanwhile, David O'Doherty decided that his ambition was to win the Olympic 100 metres Gold Medal, and although this didn't seem like a very realistic prospect it emerged that David was a triple jump champion whilst at school. Then another voice piped up from the back of the room, it was comedian Dan Atkinson who revealed he had also been a schoolboy triple jump champ! Who'd have thought it? Two champions in one room. What else could we do but have a competition?? (And this is just the kind of randomness that the 24 Hour Show is made of). It wouldn't be much of a competition with only two competitors so another comedian, Liverpudlian John Bishop, stepped up to the plate, although with no previous triple jump experience. To counter this lack of experience John for some reason decided he would need to remove his shoes and trousers and compete in his pants! While a space was cleared down the centre of the room, very tall Australian and chief techy support, Dan Walmsley, was drafted in to even up the competitor numbers. Lots of laughs, some very impressive standing triple jumping, and the removal of more clothing later David O'Doherty was declared the winner. This was swiftly followed by a lovely rendition of Little Drummer Boy (singing along to the David Bowie and Bing Crosby video on YouTube) to celebrate the end of the third hour. At this point Tim Key had to leave as he had two shows to do the next day but he promised he's be back and was replaced on stage by TV's very own Simon Amstell!

Next followed one of the more bizarre half hours of the experience for me. Someone decided we needed some music

to liven everyone up so we got Martin White on accordian, Amy Butterworth on violin, Andrew McClelland on harmonica, I think it was David O'Doherty on piano (I'm pretty sure James Sherwood was long gone by this point) and the multi-talented Dan Walmsley on vocals. I think the suggestion of Nothing Compares To You came from someone in the audience but given the instruments we had available and the need to be enlivened we concluded that we should have a polka version, and for some reason the chorus should be sung in German! But of course a polka needed dancers and as I consider myself a very able polka dancer (it's one of the first things I learnt at ballet classes when I was four!) I volunteered and was joined by Amy from This Ambitious Orchestra where we proceeded to dance a polka on a very tiny stage whilst (Never Mind The Buzzcocks' Presenter) Simon Amstell looked on!! And we all know I'm just a big show off so being involved and having all those people look at me was ace. I think at this point Mark also mentioned to the rest of the audience that I was having to go to Glasgow to register for university in the morning - which I wasn't really looking forward to but at least I knew there would be no problems getting back into the show.

The end of hour four brought Silent Night, in a rather disastrous 12 part round and a sad story about love from David O'Doherty, re-enacted by members of the audience. This led to an appeal for anyone else with a sad story to tell and fellow Angry (Feet)er Misha volunteered to tell us the tale of her nightmare date with a guy who actually claimed to think Dr Who is real. Again this was re-enacted by the audience with comics Matt Kirshen and of course DO'D joining in. We never did get to the end of the story though as Simon Amstell deemed it time to introduce us to some fan written slash fiction on the internet involving him and several members of McFly. This also created a Twitter challenge as a request was sent out to those following the show at home to send in their own slash fiction about Simon and Mark! We also hit hour five around here somewhere and celebrated with the most cheerful of carols; Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.

After this followed the first of several games of 'Find A Thing' where a team of boys and a team of girls were sent outside (which was a bit of a scary, but welcome, prospect having been cooped up in the dark and airless Ace Dome all night) and given 20 minutes to find the best, worst and cutest things beginning with the letter G. Bringing back a guitar and a giant Rhod Gilbert poster clinched a win for the girls in this round.

At this point we decided that everyone could do with some air and as Sammy J had returned ready for his challenge we all went outside and managed to dress him in 50 items of audience clothes and accessories (including my belt, watch and Fringe Press Pass!). This all had to be done at great speed as the Pleasance staff had informed us they didn't a license for us to conduct any part of the show outside. It was now about 7.15am which meant not only was it time for Sammy to head for the airport but also time for me to get the train to Glasgow for my university registration. I was pretty gutted I was having to go but this was too important to miss unfortunately. Everyone cheered and waved as I left. I was fairly confident I wouldn't need to be away too long and promised to keep everyone updated with my progress via Twitter as I went. Also, in order to still be a part of the show, I took with my a book of Andrew Motion poetry (there was someone who was trying to keep Andrew Motion in motion for the entire 24 hours and at least one audience member had been reading Motion's poetry since the show began. So now, not only would the poetry be in motion by being read but also actually be in motion as it went to Glasgow and back. The trip to Glasgow and back was uneventful. I did sneak a doze on the train, went to the university office, handed in my forms, got my student card and was back on the train 40 minutes later. A quick stop in Starbucks to get my a giant cup of tea and a coffee for Mr Watson and I was back at the show. I'm not sure what I missed while I was gone, apart from a couple more Christmas Carols and the news that Stephen Fry had tweeted about New Scottish Time to his 700,000 followers! And Sammy J had been to the airport, almost been arrested, come back and shown everyone a video of his exploits in the time I was gone. Oh and Mark Watson learned to skip and to salsa!

As this is already the longest blog ever I'm going to end part one here - at about 10.30am on Tuesday 18th August 2009 - 9 hours down, 13 hours to go. I will conclude tomorrow.

By the way - thanks to Linzy (twitter.com/angryfeet) who tweeted from twitter.com/watson24hour throughout the show and without looking back at the feed I would never have been able to remember everything that happened and certainly not the order it happened in.