Aristocratic

I'm now officially on holidays. That's it. No more work until the 29th December and goddamn am I bored already. Lying in bed this morning I stared at the ceiling trying to figure out how to occupy my days now that I don't have to travel to a gig, and have nothing immediate to write for. I mean, I could relax, but I am the proud owner of itchy feet, and not because I have Athlete's Foot or anything. I'm just not going to be comfortable trying to be comfortable. I will have to set myself some sort of task or plan to get me through till work starts up again. I might build a den. We haven't tested if our living room has all the items needed for den building so that could be a good task. Only problem might be if some over adventurous foxes move in. Or it becomes a permanent fixture and gets dirty. Dirty den. Boom. Sigh. Maybe I do need to just sit down and do nothing for a bit.

I feel its deserved as my final gig of the season was a tough one. Not for usual Christmas gig reasons but more because it was a specific gig that I hadn't worked hard enough towards. It was an evening of comics giving their interpretation of the 'Aristocrats' joke, a gag that for years, mostly on the US circuit, was a backstage joke amongst acts where through a simple premise would vent all the filth they wouldn't say on stage during their act. There was a whole film about it and stuff and I'm going to be ignorant and assume you all know exactly what I'm talking about, because everyone does, right? Right? No. It appears by 75% of the audience leaving over the first half of the night that they really don't. Even if they did, certain changes have to be made to the structure of that gag for it to be audience friendly. Backstage it doesn't need punchlines or wordplay to keep other comedians interested, but onstage hearing acts reel out gross happenings after gross happenings, there's only so many incest based pornographic self indulgence an audience member can take. There were some stand-out performances including a reverse Aristocrats gag by Sean Brightman which was ace. The family all do lovely things such as have a picnic, but the title of the act is the most base sweary name you could have. My joke in comparison was poor, not least because I hadn't really worked on it but also because I was more drunk than I should have been and had mostly given up knowing that there were only seven real people left in the audience.

It wasn't the gig's fault I'd decided to drink my way through the evening. Yes the fact that there was less than 10 people to disappoint did help, but it was also my last gig before Xmas so some celebration felt necessary. None of this was helped by having a sad chat with a homeless man on the way to the gig. I bought a Big Issue off him and spent some time asking him where he was staying in this weather. He said he'd managed to find someone's floor to sleep on but the last few nights he'd been sleeping by a gate. I'm finding it hard just walking anywhere in this snow let alone trying to gain enough warmth to slumber in it. I told him to take care and he wished me a Merry Christmas and told me to go and get a pint. I watched everyone else just ignore him (it was Islington. They are good at that) and felt all a bit miserable for him. So I did go and get a pint. Blame the homeless man for my shoddy set. Above all else my rather ill thought out gag involved questioning how they got an audition at a talent agent's so easily. Then it was followed by them all doing a musical version of the Aristocats whereby the dog pet was confused by being made to partake and thorough opposed having to bark along to 'Everybody Wants To Be Cat'. He noted that the pet cat hadn't been forced to come along and was jealous of this, ironically wanting to be a cat. It all culminated rather boringly with the family getting on a shitty Saturday night TV talent show as we now live in a society that is apathetic towards the problems going on with our government yet will willingly mock the mentally ill on national television. I feel I lost the audience at the first bit. I really must stop gigging drunk. Sigh.

Either way, that's it for several days. I might make a list of things I should and want to do. This list will include: making a list (always a good first one to have, therefore you can tick it off straight away), do some sleeping (I've done some. I'd like to do more), kill some zombies (this is a necessity. I mean mostly on Red Dead Undead Nightmare, but if any real ones show up I'll be ready), eat all of Tom's nice biscuits (he doesn't know this yet but I can't be bothered to go and buy food and that's all we have in). Winner. And by winner, I mean loser. Roll on the 29th.