A luxurious lie in until 10am as I was working the afternoon. But urgh - dehli belly caused by those hot chillies so no left overs for lunch just a yummy Red Delicious apple and a cuppa.
That evening we had tickets to see Imran Yusuf at the Underbelly and then later Josie Long at the Stand. I was really excited about Imran Yusuf as whenever we have seen him on the telly he has been hilarious.
Before the show we treated ourselves to a very rushed dinner at Mums Great Comfort Food which was a brilliant find. I enjoyed my choice of veggie sauces and had champ for the first time. But the best bit was the Tempest Brewing Company Holyrood Pale ale. It was DELICIOUS.
Now to the show which was in the Wee Coo - a very long shed painted black. Imran Yusuf was doing a new show Roar of the Underdog. As it was a pre-Festival show there were not many of us in the wee coo shed. Apparently 34 of us. How do I know? He said it about 6 times at least. And I think he was counting himself and the crew. I don't know what happened as before the show I was raving about him to the people outside and jumping up and down with excitement. It was AWFUL. It was raining. We walked into the shed and were urged to sit at the front. After some rap music, he announced himself and came out in casual clothes, not the shiny suits that he wore when on the telly. He is a lot taller than he looks on the box. Notes in hand he explained that he hadn't been to Fringe for 2 years. Too close to home in parts (he's an Asian born in East Africa who great up in London, though much younger than me). He worked for Sega where one of my brothers was for a while (they never met). The first story was about him being a Godfather to a Catholic friend's kid - something Mr P.M. knew all about as he is Godfather to my catholic niece. Every story was long and what started off as a grin in my face changed to a grimace. The stories were long. At times it felt like a lecture. And a lot of it felt a bit too racist for me. He did something about trying to change people's perception of Muslims but by this time, I was so bored and regretting my front row seat that I didn't care. He didn't make eye contact with me but did with Mr P.M. who did laugh. At the end of the show he just said he wanted to be liked and was happy to meet people outside and sign autographs.
My review: the boy grew up and got all serious - my humour bone cracked but not with laughter.
Josie Long at the Stand - umm well we went along and found out that actually the show had been cancelled a few weeks back. After the Imran show I was LIVID. The staff at Stand were really lovely trying to find out if we had been refunded. They emailed the Fringe staff to find out if we had been refunded.
Date night was over. I had a thundercloud over me and was angry beyond belief that our evening had been so awful. To top it off my feet were killing me (stupid Karrimor shoes) and Mr P.M. who had aleady made the mistake of laughing at the earlier show hadn't really seemed that bothered about the cancellation. So No, I didn't want a drink. I just wanted to go home.
At home, still fuming I check and both The Fringe site and Josie Long's site still had the show listed. Tehre was link to here Twitter feed and the rage went into overflow as I saw a tweet from her saying how happy she was to be in Edinburgh.WTF. A twitter exchange followed where it turns out she is actually quite a lovely person, was very sympathetic about my rage and offered to get us VIP tickets. I turned those down as it wouldn't have been fun but at least now when she's on the Stewart Lee Alternative Comedy Experience, I won't turn off.
Fringe lessons learnt:
1. Don't believe the Fringe site
2. Don't believe Artist's site
3. Always ring the venue to check a show is on
4. We had been refunded but as I had decided to save the extortionate £4 per show booking online, the Fringe didn't have my details to tell me the show is cancelled. Hmmm not really a lesson here - I still hate that fee more than this risk of going to shows that aren't on.
5. Don't go to bed in tears and angry as no-one gets a cuddle and a cold wall between couples is a big waste in kid-free weeks.
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