Sorry for lack of blog over two days. I have been stupidly busy and continue to be so. I was in Aberdeen on Tuesday so obviously that takes out most of yesterday as well coming back from the crazy grey city in the middle of nowhere. It was another good night with the right result but I never really got a load of Edinburgh stuff out so I still remain behind and chasing my tail on that one.

Tonight it's the turn of Sutton Coldfield where I've played many times before indeed I've done a preview there in the past but tonight will be a big test. I've got a lot of talky bits sorted but I've not really put them to the test much so tonight will have to be the night because the next preview is on the 19th of July.

After I played football on Monday night (full details in my 'And In The Sport' column) I relaxed by channel hopping and saw the much celebrated Russell Brand on one of the cable channels. He's another one that passes me by. I cannot get him or his appeal. Maybe I'm just a bit too old and I'm like one of the dickie bow tie fellers in the 70s dismayed by Billy Connolly's then success when he had 'no jokes' or maybe I'm fuckin right. He just strikes me as a spoilt kid craving for attention. 

 He was doing live stand up and patronisingly explaining via a graph that the audience had been asked before the show whether they'd like to meet the Dalai Lama. His words were 'There were 92% that would like to meet the Dalai Lama, fair enough, but what I find weird is that there's 8% that WOULDN'T like to meet the Dalai Lama'. There was hoots of derision at this observation ie everyone in the crowd was on Russell's side. He then picked out a person in the crowd that had no interest in meeting the Dalai Lama and that person was singled out by Brand publically as some sort of remedial for not wanting to meet what is a human being after all. I'm with the atheist types on this one. The bloke is a homo erectus or whatever we're called in the biological sense. I've no interest in meeting him either Russell, but I guess that's why I'm not a Beatles type fan of yours.

By stark contrast, I was very down when I heard the news yesterday morning that Eric Sykes had died. Probably the last of that Goon show, demob comic, BBC ITV glory days era, he came to prominence as a writer and then wrote the entire series of the sitcom 'Sykes' that ran from the early 60s right through to about 1980. He is critically acclaimed for 'The Plank', a modern silent film with himself, Tommy Cooper and many others in it, also he wrote up until late in his life, stuff about science fiction in a piss take way. He was a chat show guest, I saw him do many a sketch on telly and I really wish I'd met him.

If you get the chance, try and find the Sykes episode from 1972 with Peter Sellers in it who plays a villian who comes to the house and the coppers are after him. There's slapstick, women's clothes swapping and great one liners. The greatest bit that brought tears to my eyes though was him and Sellers corpsing when trying to deliver lines whilst looking at eachother. Tell me what other art form or indeed what other part of the theatre can incorporate this and make it brilliant. You can see a mutual respect and a great affection from two greats of the music hall, radio and of course telly and film. I hope they're up there now swapping......no sorry stop that it sounds fuckin silly. Look good on you Eric, you made my life better by being a funny bloke, so much better than silly skinny boys from Essex that haven't written a good joke in their life yet for some reason got a lifetime achievement award at the Comedy Awards a few year back-bizarre.

I'll tell you all about my preview exploits tomorrow. In the meantime have a great day people.

TODAY'S BLOG IS SPONSORED BY THE ORIGINAL CAT AT THE BEGINNING OF CORONATION STREET.  

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