Fit like,

As working weeks go, last week was fucking mental. Any hopes of a settling-in period with my new route were dashed with a 14-hour day on Monday. Things didn’t get easier as the week went on, with 60 hours worked by knocking-off time on Friday. Chuck in a 10-hour shift with Mara on Saturday and travelling to two gigs, and you’ve got an 80-hour working week. It was a joy to get home at 5.30 on Saturday and switch off til this morning.

There were a few hindrances that helped make last week the nightmare it was. Here are my top three horrors:-

3) BEING BITTEN BY A DOG. This one didn’t really hold me up but it was a pain in the arse (literally). I was getting a parcel out of the van when this beast came from nowhere and bit right through my jeans and into my flesh. Turns out, the parcel wasn’t for that farm anyway!

2) DROPPING PARCEL AT THE WRONG HOUSE. I put the postcode into the satnav and set off for my next drop. The trouble with delivering to cottages in the countryside is that several over a large radius have the same postcode, so I rarely go to the right one first time. On this occasion, the satnav took me to a cottage with a horsebox in the drive. The instructions on the parcel were to leave it in the horsebox if no-on was in. I’ve found the right place first time, result! The horsebox was locked so I presumed they’d forgotten to leave it open and put the parcel in the shed instead. Several hours later I got a phone call from an irate customer asking where his parcel was. I told him that I’d left it in the shed cos the horsebox was locked. He told me that not only was he in the whole day and the horsebox was open, but he doesn’t have a shed. I then had to drive 18miles to pick up the parcel and from the wrong house and drop it at the right house – 500yards away.

1) DRIVING ACROSS SOMEONE’S GRASS. As a professional driver, I’ve heard some real horror stories of drivers being misdirected by their satnavs, and I suffered at the hands of mine on Wednesday. I followed its instructions as it took me down a dirt track, that curved onto a road that was almost entirely grass. I thought this didn’t look right but could see that the house was only 500yards away so presumed it was right enough.. As I went round the next corner, I was met by a mass of trees and shrubbery on either side of a really narrow track. The van didn’t fit down the track but there was no way I could reverse the way I’d come so I had to go for it, scratching the (hire) van and breaking off part of the wing mirror in the process. Still, the satnav said I was only 300yards away so all I had to do was go round the next corner and......there was a gate. The gate opened so that was fine, but behind the gate was a beautifully tendered lawn. The only way I could get to the house was by crossing the grass. I hoped that the owner would be out so I didn’t have to face anyone, but she came running out in her slippers, waving her hands in horror as I made two beautifully even tyre tracks down the middle of her lawn. She expressed her amazement at my stupidity and took my work’s details so she could get compensated for the damage.

Although last week was a nightmare, this week started positively. I bought a new satnav, one which stores a house’s destination so that when I find a house once, it will navigate me back there in the future. Plus I got home at the remarkable early time of 6pm today!

Fit like,

I had three gigs over the weekend, the first time in a while that I’ve been gigging both Friday and Saturday nights. The best thing about it was that I was on with other acts from the North-East at all three gigs. I like it when promoters book travel companions to do a gig with me – mainly cos it gives me company and helps with the petrol costs but also cos I appreciate the need for Aberdeen acts to gig south of Dundee in order to improve and move up the comedy ladder. I also know that Jason Murphy, Scott Forbes and Peter Wood appreciated that I helped them get a gig and gave them a lift there in exchange for ten pounds sterling.

The problem comes when an act takes the piss. If I ask a promoter to book an Aberdeen-based line-up and then offer a (rare) paid gig to an act who I consider as a friend, I expect them to meet me halfway. Several weeks ago, I persuaded Chris Broomfield to give a paid gig to one of my comedy chums at the State Bar, despite the fact he had never seen him before. On Friday, I spoke to the act in question and checked he was still okay to do the gig the following night. He confirmed that he was and said he’d get back to me later that night to arrange me picking him up. I still hadn’t heard from him yesterday afternoon so texted to ask him where I was picking him up. Still no word by 5pm and it was time to leave so phoned him – no answer at house or on mobile. Thus followed an apologetic phone call to Chris, telling him that the act I persuaded him to book wasn’t in the car with me, and I had no idea why. Luckily, he managed to get Dave Heffron to step in and the Heff gave possibly teh best performance I’ve ever seen him give.

Although this isn’t the first time the act in question has pulled out of a gig without so much of a phone call (he didn’t show up to Snafu earlier this year without letting anyone no), my first reaction was that he had possibly suffered some sort of emergency, especially when I still hadn’t heard from him this morning. However, a glance at his Facebook page showed that he was on at 6am this morning. Why has he not even attempted an apology for deciding not to do the gig and not giving me the chance to offer the gig to another Aberdeen-based act? Only he can answer that, and I doubt he will.

I often get frustrated when I book a gig for acts from  the North-East and they pull out on the day or a day or two before, cos they’re ill, working, got a better offer, can’t be arsed – and some acts are worse for it than others - but this is the first time I’ve been let down so badly. I pride myself on human decency and expect the same standards from other people. When it doesn’t happen, it pisses me off. Maybe I’m in the wrong game for that.

Away from comedy, Friday 13^th came a day early for me. Thursday 12^th was a total fucking nightmare. My first day on my new regular run was horrendous. I worked from 7am til 9pm and spent half the day asking for directions up dirt tracks (that’s not a metaphor). I missed out on a game of football followed by a hot bath followed by going to see Scott Agnew at the Lemon Tree. The day got worse when I lost my phone in someone’s muddy path (again, not a metaphor). I haven’t lost a phone in about seven years, so it really annoyed me. I don’t care about the phone cos Orange are sending a better one, but the hundreds of contacts will take forever to get back again. I know, I should’ve backed them up at some point. The good thing that came out of Nightmare Thursday was that the bosses were impressed that I kept going til 9pm and didn’t chuck in the towel earlier. Friday was a lot less hellish and tomorrow promises to be easier as well. Hopefully days like Thursday will be few and far between cos I enjoy the job when it’s not going mental.

Fit like,

That’s me two weeks into my new job, and it’s been a steep learning curve. Although it’s not the most taxing of professions, I’ve been thrown into the deep end and have had to sink or swim. It’s been mental since I started, with me doing 125 hours in the two weeks since I started (plus 14 at Mara thrown in for good measure). I don’t mind putting in the hours and the overtime will come in handy in the run up to Xmas, but it’s leaving me with very little spare time. I’ve already missed seeing Caitlin twice and missed three training sessions. I haven’t missed any gigs but I would’ve missed one last week – I was due to do Gary Little’s gig in Paisley last Thursday, so on Wednesday morning I told the supervisor that I needed to finish at 5pm the following day and was told ‘We’ll see what we can do’. Gary phoned later that day to say that the gig had been cancelled, but I didn’t tell the supervisor. The following day I wasn’t finished til 6pm, so would’ve been late for the gig. I’ve got a similar problem on Friday, when I need to finish at 5.30 in order to do a gig in Carluke. Again I told my supervisor that I needed an early finish of Friday, again I was met with a response of ‘We’ll see what we can do’, which doesn’t fill me with confidence.

One thing that’s pissed me off about this job is the ignorance of most of the drivers. Most of them will muster a grunt if I make conversation, stare at me in silence if I say hello and look right through me when I walk past. There’s no rhyme or reason to it either – new or experienced, old or young, Scottish or Polish, most of them are the same. There are exceptions (and the ones who do chat have been really friendly) but I’m disappointed that I’ve gone from a job where I’m not allowed to talk to anyone to one where hardly anyone wants to talk!

From the conversations I have managed to have with other drivers, I’ve managed to paint a picture of what the company’s like – and it’s not a pretty one. Apparently the company has a reputation for taking on drivers in the run-up to Xmas and then booting them out in January. Apparently the reason a few drivers left at the same time recently was cos they weren’t getting paid all their overtime. No point in worrying that either of those things will happen to me, might as well just keep my head down and get down with it.

Away from work, I had a great gig on Saturday night. I was doing an after-dinner for an amateur football team in Peterhead, where I shared the bill with Liverpool legend Alan Kennedy. Not only that but I gave him a lift to the gig from his hotel in Aberdeen and a lift home again. I had to wait over an hour for him after the gig while he signed autographs and posed for photos, but it was worth it to hear tales of the great Liverpool teams of the 80s.

Fit like,

It’s been a hectic and eventful week at Tawse Towers. I finally found a new job! Started at Aberdeen Express couriers  as a driver. It all came rather out of the blue as well. I’d been told at the start of the week that I’d be off on Wednesday and Thursday, so I spent Tuesday preparing for two days of putting up posters for my ironing business. As usual, Rachel was trawling the internet at work looking for jobs for me, and she gave me a phone number for a vacancy for a courier. I recognised the name as one I’d applied for before so I didn’t hold out much hope. At 5pm, I was ironing some guy’s shirts when I got a phone call – it was the guy from that job, asking questions about past experience etc. After a few minutes of chit-chat, he offered me the job on the condition that I started the next day. After a brief consultation with Rachel, I decided I would go for it. I figured that the best thing to do would be to give it a go on the Wednesday and if I enjoyed it, tell Hugh on the Thursday that I was leaving.

Wednesday went really well. I was thrown in at the deep end and given two runs in Mastrick and Northfield to do. I wasn’t finished til 7pm but it went really well, so I decided to leave Mara. I wasn’t looking forward to telling Hugh, especially since I couldn’t give him any notice. He was okay about it and understood my situation, wishing me well. I agreed to work on Saturday since I wasn’t giving any notice and that’s the busiest day.

A few hours later, I was worried I’d made th wrong decision. I was given a run in the area between Laurencekirk and Stonehaven and it was a fucking nightmare. Most of my drops were cottages in the middle of nowhere that the satnav had difficulty finding. As a result, half of my day was spent knocking on doors asking for directions. I didn’t enjoy it at all and imagined that everyday could be like this. I’ve been quite priviliged that I’ve really enjoyed the jobs I’ve done over the last ten years so didn’t fancy one where I’d dread going in every morning. Rachel was really supportive and said all the right things about giving it a chance and how it would get better when I was settled in, but I still had a sleepless night worrying about how it was going to be.

Thankfully Friday was better. I was in the Banff/Portsoy area and found most of the places okay. There were a couple of cottages that were hard to find but I didn’t see the point in flapping about it and just got on with asking people for directions. I wasn’t home til 7pm for the second night in a row but it was a much more successful day. Plus ten hours overtime in three days showed I’ll make more money than I was doing at Mara before I left. Sadly it’s monthly pay so I don’t get a wage til the end of November, so I’m looking for plenty of gigs and ironing customers!

Yesterday was another day that shows my life’s turning into a sitcom. Since I don’t need to worry about getting sacked by Mara anymore, I decided to take Caitlin to work in the fish van for the first time since the day the van broke down. So what happened yesterday? The fucking van broke down. We were stuck in the car park of the Burrelton Park Inn from 2.30 til 7.30, when the AA finally decided that they wouldn’t manage to get a recovery truck to us anytime soon and arranged for us to get a taxi back to Aberdeen (if only they’d decided that at 3pm). It meant that by the time I got home at 9.15, I couldn’t be arsed going to the girl from work’s engagement party, so we just stayed in and got pished. I felt really bad for Caitlin. Not only did she not get an ice-cream and a look in the shops in Blairgowrie like I’d promised, but we were so late home that she wasn’t able to go trick-or-treating. To be fair to her though, she didn’t moan once in the five hours we were stuck in a pub car park. Six months ago she would’ve been bubbling about  it the whole time, but she seems to have matured a lot recently and I’m loving the time we’re spending together.

Fit like,

It was nice to put all my stresses to one side and have a fantastic weekend. One of those weekends where nothing out of the ordinary happened but it was memorable.

It started on Friday night when I headlined a new gig at a nightclub in Arbroath. I was apprehensive about it because it was the first night of comedy there - but looking forward to it cos it was run by Scott Forbes, and his Montrose gig is one of the best gigs I’ve done this year. When we arrived, there were only a dozen or so punters in the room. At this moment I feared the worst. The room began to fill up by 9pm but some of them gave the impression that they would be quite boisterous, especially the guy who kept walking onto the stage and making a tit of himself. Again I feared the worst. I didn’t need to cos it was a cracking gig. Scott did a great job of MCing by keeping them in check, having a bit of banter with the right ones and using his best material. Ed Patrick went on first, the second time in a week I’d been on with him. I love following him cos I know that when I see his dark stuff getting a great response, I’ll do okay. Kevin McCallum went on and did a Shakespeare monologue, which was too big a gamble in a town where most people have never heard of Shakespeare, and he never recovered. Peter Wood brought the room back with a display every bit as good as his SCOTY performance. By the time I went on, people were starting to pay to get into the club without wanting to see comedy. I thought that would cause me problems but they were attentive and responsive along with the rest of the crowd. One of my favourite gigs this year.

Caitlin was supposed to be staying with us on Saturday night but wasn’t able to in case she caught Rachel’s swine flu (apparently she can get it again). It was nice to have a quiet Saturday night in just the two of us and we took advantage of the clocks going back by playing Scrabble til the wee hours. I won every game except one but Rachel’s definitely getting better and is now a worthy adversary. I’m still looking for other challengers though!

I had Caitlin all day on Sunday and we weren’t allowed to come back to the flat (swine flu again). We went to Jimmy Chung’s for breakfast and bought tickets for the cinema at 6pm, leaving us six hours to kill in between. We tried to go swimming but a lifeguard shortage meant they could only let a certain number of folk in, and it was going to be an hour til we got in, so we went into town instead. I’m not sure how we managed to spend so long in town spending very little money but we did it. I was proud of Caitlin for not spending all hee money – normally she makes sure she spends every penny she has whether there’s stuff she wants or not. It’s a sign of maturity that she didn’t spend it all on any old shite. It was a great day out, well worth missing Liverpool’s third straight humping of Man Utd for.

Sadly it was back to the normal stresses yesterday. Hugh announced that I’ll be on a four-day week from now on. That wouldn’t be so bad if it was Monday-Thursday, then I could motivate myself to get gigs at weekends in England. Sadly it’s Wednesdays and Thursdays I’m off from now on. The wages just keep going down and down.

The other stress I got yesterday came when I texted tonight’s headliner at Snafu to check he was still okay, and he replied saying he’d forgotten he was doing it and couldn’t do it. This came three days after NEXT week’s headliner pulled out, making it four headliners cancelling in six weeks – three of whom were meant to be driving other acts up. We changed the format of the night so there were less open spots cos they kept pulling out, but I didn’t expect to get this much hassle from headliners. Thankfully Graeme Thomas stepped in to fill tonight’s slot but I’m still looking for a replacement for next week.

Fit like,

Regular readers (the hard-core, if you will) may remember the blog I wrote some time ago, criticising Bavaria Auto Werke after they ripped us off when they were ‘fixing’ the air conditioning. I thought it only fair that I redress the balance by praising a garage that helped us.

Aberdeen Autobody came highly recommended cos they used to fix all Mara’s vans until they got too busy to repair them as quickly as we needed them. I took the BMW there for its MOT last year and although it was an expensive MOT, it needed a lot done. A couple of weeks ago, I noticed weird noise so decided to put the car in for its service early. It needed a new backbox for the exhaust and one or two other things, so I brought it back in today to get that done.

When I went to collect the car, I got a pleasant surprise. Not only had he managed to find the parts for cheaper than expected, but he didn’t charge me for the labour cos he should’ve spotted these things when he did the MOT in June. I was really impressed by the gesture cos I know fuck all about cars and would’ve been none the wiser if he charged me. So if anyone’s looking for a garage that won’t rip you off, I can thoroughly recommend Aberdeen Autobody on Poynernook Road.

I had my meeting with the boss about the letter I sent him. He was full of apologies, explanations and promises that things would change, so the atmosphere at work has changed for the better since then. Unfortunately, my hours are still pish so I’m still hunting for a new job and some more ironing customers.

It’s Rachel’s turn to have swine flu. She’s not the most patient of patients so it’s really frustrating that she’s stuck in, especially so soon after spending seven weeks off work recovering from an operation. Hopefully she’ll be okay after a week indoors – that’s all Caitlin took to recover and she’s back to normal now. Had a fun couple of hours with her yesterday and looking forward to a full day with her on Sunday. It might be a struggle finding things to fill the day since Rachel’s swine flu means I can’t take Caitlin to the flat, and the rain doesn’t show any signs of stopping by the weekend!

Still no sign of me catching swine flu. Guess I’m indestructible.

Fit like,

JOB UPDATE – The boss has received my letter and it appears to have given him a kick up the arse. He’s never been put in this position before and doesn’t know how to deal with it, but we’re having a meeting at some point this week about it – thankfully with another member of staff present. All he’s said about the letter is that most of the points in the letter can be cleared up quite simply and that my dad dying has nothing to do with everything changing at work. I do think that sending the letter will cause a better atmosphere at work, but it’s not going to get me more hours. I only did 24 hours this week and that’s not enough.

I had an interview on Wednesday for Norscott Vending Services, filling up and sleaning vending machines. Not the greatest job in the world but many parts of it would’ve been similar to the job I had – and enjoyed – for several years at Gamestec. Although it was a lower hourly rate than I’m on at the moment, the hours were ideal, it was easy to get Friday’s off, more holidays, different routes every day, chance to build up rapport with each customer, incentives for finding the company new business. Plus the company is doing well in the recession and have never made anyone redundant. And the owner of the company has a passion outside work (racing cars) so would’ve been sympathetic to my passion for comedy, something which my current boss isn’t. I was pretty gutted that I didn’t get the job cos I really thought I’d done enough. The interview went really well and I’ve had experience in similar roles. There aren’t a lot of jobs out there, so I’m pretty down about not getting one that I felt I was perfect for. When I left college in 1997 with an HND in journalism, I never imagined that twelve years later I wouldn’t manage to get a job filling vending machines.

As one door closes, another one slams shut. Rachel also had an interview this week, for a job that would’ve solved all our problems and created new opportunities for us. Alas, she was also pipped by someone with more experience.

It’s been strange not seeing Caitlin this week. She was fevered and ill on Monday so Kelly phoned the doctor, who suspected that she had swine flu. A visit confirmed this, so she’s been confined to the house all week and hasn’t even been allowed visitors. Apart from a cough, she’s fine now – she’s just frustrated at having to spend her holidays cooped up in her house. Hopefully I’ll see her on Wednesday.

Strange gig in Elgin on Friday night. It was in a lovely hotel and the room was nice, but the crowd was a bit small for the size of it. After a bit of crowd re-arranging by compere Graeme Thomas, they were nicely arranged. First problem was that the mic didn’t work for the first fifteen minutes (frustrating that this hadn’t been checked before the show started). Second problem was that the crowd contained a couple of groups of pensioners, an eight-year-old girl and a fucking DOG. Third problem was that fifteen minutes into my set, the fire alarm went off and everyone had to go outside. Despite all that, I enjoyed the gig.

Fit like,

My situation at work has got a whole lot worse. Before my dad died, I was doing 60 hours a week. Next week I will be doing somewhere around the 25 hour mark, while the new driver is doing the big runs I used to do. When I was told I was having to take a day off during the week, I asked the boss if I could take the day as a holiday, since I’ve nine days holidays left and no need to take them. I also asked if I could take the next two Wednesdays as holidays so that I could spend time with Caitlin while she’s off school. The way he reacted, you’d have thought I’d just asked if I could lick his face. He ordered me into his office, slamming open doors on the way. Then he started shouting and swearing at me about how shit my attitude is, how I have to have everything my own way and how I’m not willing to do anything to help the company. Everything he threw at me was unfair, but whenever I tried to defend myself he looked more angry and I honestly thought he was going to take a swing at me at one point.

It’s now become obvious that he’s trying to force me out. Tomorrow is Jim’s day off but he’s asked him to work and told me I have to take the day off. This doesn’t benefit him at all, cos Jim’s on a higher hourly rate than me. Telling me I have to take individual days off as unpaid days rather than holidays doesn’t benefit him either, taking my nine days off in one go means that he has to cover at least one Friday and Saturday when things are busy. He’s obviously hoping that I’ll get sick of the situation and find another job. To be fair, I am trying. I’ve got an interview with an agency tomorrow so fongers crossed that goes well. It’s only temporary work until Xmas but at least it gets me out of a job that makes me desperately unhappy. I’m raging at myself that I didn’t take the job I got offered at FedEx a couple of months ago cos I’m now making less money than I was offered at FedEx.

Things have got so bad that I contacted Citizens Advice to see how I should deal with it. They told me to write Hugh a letter listing everything that’s changed at work since I came back from compassionate leave and send it to him via recorded delivery. He’ll get it tomorrow – I just wish I could see his face when he opens it.

To try and make up for the loss in earnings, I’ve decided to set up an ironing service. I actually enjoy ironing and I’m pretty good at it so I thought I might as well try and make some money out of it. I know plenty of people who either don’t have the time to iron or simply can’t be arsed with it. For £10 a bag, I’m hoping those people will be tempted to get it done by someone else.

On a happier note, I had a couple of cracking gigs this week. Supporting Milton Jones at the Lemon Tree was a lot of fun. I was glad to finally get the chance to play at one of Aberdeen Performance Arts ‘big three’ venues. I’ve always been envious of the less experienced acts who have played at the Lemon Tree – and Caitlin’s been winding me up for a few months that she’s played at the venue and I haven’t! I was really nervous before the gig cos there were some kids in the audience. Their parents had been warned that there would be some swearing, but I was asked not to go OTT and be careful with the content. It went pretty well, and Milton gave me some good advice on furthering my career.

Masada FC had their first fundraising night on Friday. The night was my idea cos I wanted a chance to do an hour of stand-up in front of my team-mates. I’m still a bit shy with the players who weren’t at the club when I left in 2006, so I saw it as a good chance to come out of my shell. Rachel organised the prizes for the raffle and she managed to get her hands on some cracking signed football shirts, nights at hotels, meal vouchers etc. The night was a huge success, earning £1070 for the club. The earnings were topped up when the winner of the star prize (Manchester United shirt from last season’s Champions League Final signed by the entire squad) decided to auction it off and raised an extra £260.

I was brought back down to earth last night when I died on my hole in front of thirty or so medical students who were raising money for the Terence Higgins Trust. Oh well, can’t win them all.

Fit like,

Congratulations to John Gavin on winning the fourth Scottish Comedian Of The Year final at the Old Fruitmarket in Glasgow at the weekend. I am very proud of the fact that in finishing joint-second with Teddy, he and I became the first people to finish in the top three for a second time. Rachel reckoned that I would have won had it been judged by audience voting. I can’t comment cos I chose not to watch any of the other acts. All I know is that I gave a flawless ten minutes and I’ve no regrets about anything I did. The timing was spot on, the delivery slick and confident. Even the notoriously hard-to-please Steve Bennett gave me a reasonably good review - http://www.chortle.co.uk/about/2009/09/28/9698/scottish_comedian_of_the_year_2009

Preparations for the final were ideal. I was on at the Stand five nights in the week leading up to the final, including my first weekend as main support in Glasgow. Headlining Red Raw in Edinburgh on Monday wasn’t the greatest as the crowd was smaller and slightly subdued, but the four gigs in Glasgow were awesome. Although I was tired by Saturday evening with all the travelling back and forth and getting little sleep, doing so many gigs had led me getting sharper with each gig. Rachel came with me on and we stayed in a hotel, giving me a precious long lie on the morning of the final. After brunch we did a bit of shopping both in town and at the legendary Barras. We had a lovely Italian meal and I headed to George Square to meet Chris Forbes for a pre-gig nerve-settler while Rachel finished getting ready. I was chuffed that Forbesy agreed to meet me as I felt like an Englishman in New York walking around Weegieland on my own!

We were last to arrive at the venue and organiser Alan Anderson wasn’t best pleased at our tardiness. What struck me was how nervous some of the more experienced acts appeared to be. It was certainly an experienced line-up  - although I’ve been doing stand-up for four and a half years, there were five acts who had being going for longer. I was surprisingly nerveless, worrying only about Rachel sitting in the crowd on her own. I didn’t have to worry cos defending champion Scott Agnew and his partner sat with her for the whole show and made her feel really welcome.

I decided not to watch any of the other acts, preferring to chill out backstage. I was the only one who adopted this strategy and was therefore left in the green room on my own. I hadn’t brought a paper so ended up walking to a newsagent to buy FHM. It was quite amusing that one of the jokes featured in the magazine was done on stage by one of the acts taking part in the final! Rachel was keeping me updated with texts telling me how the acts were doing and if anyone did any jokes on subjects that I was planning talking about (thankfully that didn’t happen).

As I walked out to the side of the stage ten minutes before I was on, the nerves finally kicked in. Although I was glad that I wasn’t shitting my pants all night, I was relieved to have some butterflies as any performer will testify that they help the performance. Saj was the only act I saw on stage, and I was surprised that he didn’t do any of his bankable grade-A material, and struggled accordingly. That made me more nervous  but I needn’t have worried. As I walked onstage to the sound of thunderous applause and Jimmy Shand’s Bluebell Polka, I knew it was going to go well. Ten minutes later I walked off stage on a massive high.

As the ten acts waited for the results to be read out, I was quietly confident. So much so that I felt a strange mix of pride and disappointment when my name was read out as being one of the acts at joint 2^nd.

After the show came the after-show party at Maggie Mays. As well as most of the finalists, several other comedians attended. Although I class most Scottish comedians as my friends, there are one or two who I believe think I’m a major pain in the arse and I got that impression last night. The strange thing is that while all the male comics were really friendly to Rachel, the female ones barely said hello to her. Maybe that’s out of some sort of loyalty to Carly but it’s been almost two years now, get over it! I don’t get to spend time with other comedians often enough, so it was great to have a drink and chat with the likes of Mark Nelson, Steven Dick, Allan Miller, David and Neil Bratchpiece and  Neil McFarlane. We stayed at Maggie Mays til closing time at 3am and some of us went to the casino in search of more alcohol. After one drink, Rachel and I decided that enough was enough and went back to the hotel.

One pleasing aspect of the night was that I feel that I proved to Alan Anderson that I’m a better act than he thought. It’s been over six months since he told me he wouldn’t be booking me anymore cos he felt that I was going downhill as an act. He came to that conclusion without having seen me, going on the advice of an unnamed act who told Alan that I ‘sucked the energy out of the room.’ He’s seen me four times since then and I’ve stormed it each time. I was disappointed but not surprised to overhear a conversation between Rachel and Alan where he told her that although I’d done well he’d only be booking me for some of his gigs as I’m not suitable for them all. Having finished ahead of some of his favourite acts for the second time in three years, that wasn’t easy to hear.

Having finished third two years ago and joint 2^nd this year, surely the chances are high that I can finish first next year? I won’t give myself the opportunity to find out, as I won’t be entering again. I loved playing at such a marvellous venue and I showed one or two important people in the crowd what I can do, but anything other than first place next year will be a failure. I was on such a low after failing to get past my heat last year and I don’t want to suffer that feeling again. Although I won my heat easily this year, I was a couple of votes away from missing out at the semi-final stage. That bit of luck might go against me next year. Plus the twice I’ve been in the final, I’ve been beaten by an inexperienced act. As well as worrying about competing against the many talented acts currently gigging in Scotland, it could be that next year’s winner hasn’t even taken their first steps on stage yet!

All that remains is to say thanks to everyone who sent messages of support at the weekend, and who have sent messages of congratulations today. Thanks to Forbesy for meeting me for a beer. Thanks to Scott and Ryan for sitting with Rachel and being brilliant company until 4am. Thanks to everyone who had a drink with us in Maggie Mays and to the hardcore who came to the casino! Thanks mainly to Rachel for the support she’s given me through the entire competition, and helping me choose the clothes that made me the sharpest-dressed man in the competition.

Congratulations to John for winning, and for Teddy in coming joint 2^nd. Commiserations to the seven acts who weren’t placed. The standard in the final was so high that anyone could’ve been victorious. Congratulations also to Mr. Anderson for putting on a terrific show that went by without any hitches, other than two fo teh judges pulling out.

I hope I did you proud dad.

Fit like,

Despite the fact I’ve got the Scottish Comedian Of The Year final to look forward to next Sunday, and an amazing FIVE gigs at the Stanbd before then, I’ve been feeling quite down this week. I’ve cheered up a bit over the weekend but it’s worrying how low I was. There were a few things on my mind that may have contributed.

DELAYED GRIEF. We scattered my dad’s ashes at the crematorium yesterday, so hopefully I’ll get some closure now. I have a hunch that neither my sister or my auntie will be staying in touch, so it really closes a chapter in my life. With Rachel and Caitlin as my family now, I don’t feel like I’m missing out on anything.

MISSING CAITLIN. She just came back from Florida on Friday, so yesterday was the first time I’d seen her for two and a half weeks. She really enjoyed her trip but I’m glad she’s back.

HATING WORK. There’s been no let-up in my boss’ attempts to make my life a misery. We had a conversation at the start of the week where he indicated that the reason for his problem with me stems from the day I took Caitlin to work behind his back. That was two months ago so I’m guessing he’ll bear this grudge til the day I leave. While he fired criticism after criticism, I attempted to defend myself. All this did was cause him to tell me that I have a ‘terrible attitude.’ The next day, he remembered something else I’d done ages ago that pissed him off and had a go at me for that as well. He’s also put a stop to me taking the van home from work, something I’ve done since I started three years ago. There’s no benefit to him in me leaving the van at work, it’s purely done to piss me off. Petty as fuck. On top of that, my hours have been cut due to a Dundee-based driver being taken on. I was finished at 3pm twice this week. At least that gives me more time to find another job. I’ve got a couple of leads that I’ll try to follow up this week.

RACHEL’S HEALTH. Rachel’s finally back to work on Monday, having recovered from the operation to remove an abcess. She’s had a couple of smaller abcesses since then that have caused her to be in pain. I know that the abcessses are brought on by stress, so I’ll try to give her as little stress as possible from now on.

SCRATCH ON CAR. My pride and joy was damaged last week. I was dropping Kevin McCallum and Peter Wood in town at 3am after my gig in Irvine, when some clown was too busy looking at the fanny on Union Street and cut into my lane, putting a scratch along the passenger doors. It wasn’t worth swapping insurance details, but it’ll cost £100 to get it repaired. It doesn’t look too bad so I’ll leave it for now.

EVENING EXPRESS. I was pissed off two years ago when I finished third in SCOTY but didn’t get a mention in the local paper. I fired off an angry email to the editor, who accepted that it was worthy of a mention and apologised for failing to do so. When Andy won the Aberdeen SCOTY heat last year, there was a full-page article about him, with a paragraph at the end for Carly, who came second. Imagine my dismay this year when winning the Aberdeen heat got no mention and winning the semi-final was worthy only of a paragraph. The paper rightly features Aberdonians who achieve success on a national platform – Robbie Renwick, Hannah Miley, Lee McAllister, Sandi Thom, Richie Ramsay, Nicola Jolly, Nicola McLean, Amanda-Jane Taylor etc. As a publicity whore who realises the importance of being in the public eye when it comes to getting bookings, it pisses me off that I don’t get the recognition I feel my achievements deserve. Perhaps the editor’s still sulking with me cos I pointed out to him two years ago that Cameron Stout’s article is neither informative nor funny, and is frankly boring.

BURLEY STILL IN A JOB. We can look forward to another two years of disappointment now that George Burley has been told he can keep his job, thanks to a game and a half where we played well under his stewardship. His pathetic attempts to justify finishing third in our group was that we were in exactly the same position we were in two years ago. Then, we finished between Italy and the Ukraine. Now, we were in between Norway and Macedonia. Big difference.

NOT ESCAPING THE RUT. A few months ago, Rachel and I discussed a way of getting away from shit jobs and unreliable friends, and giving me the opportunity to fulfil my comedy potential in the process. We got excited at the prospect as the weeks went on but we realised this week that our plans are likely to materialise over the next couple of years. This is a big blow and changes everything. The thought of another couple of years of working hard all day and then another few hours on the road at night, often for a few quid pocket money, doesn’t fill me with much enthusiasm.