Koala Bears and Other Small Creatures Indigenous to Oz

Yet again, the only thing I've written in a month has been the recycled piece from The ACREs group FourThought blog. I really must get on top of my idleness. Having said that, enjoy this bunch of nonsense.

*****

The Modern Alternative Zoological Encyclopaedia Australica (Selected Excerpts (in No Particular Order))

“A Kangaroo!”
- Exclamation of drunken Scotsman who’s fallen bodily and become impossibly entangled therein.

Koala Bears
- Enormous aquatic mammals often seen performing at SeaWorld. Beware splash zone.

Dingo
- Reclusive invitee.

Box Spider
- Thin and stringy pubic hair growth.

Stingray!
- Stingray! Duh-duh le-luh le-luh!

Steve Irwin
- Manchester United left back of the 1990s. Not a fancy player, not a scorer of goals, but a firm hand on the tiller, Irwin earned the respect of the fans for his solid performances and his long tenure at the club. That’s Denis, isn’t it?

Ned Kelly
- Prototype robot, badly designed. Not even as good as C-3PO, who is Shit.

Big Crocodiles
- Seriously big ones. DON’T FUCK WITH THEM. If you put an elastic band over their jaws they won’t be able to open them, but there’ll probably be others nearby who will croc you to death. Not to be confused with a cockodile.

Billabong
- Fairly popular clothing brand. Clothes often strangely damp. It is believed that this is due to the ghosts of angry aborigines haunting the garments with their ghostpiss.

Australian Football
- Ludicrous joke taken to extravagant extremes.

Fosters Lager
- Export only: DO NOT DRINK!  message found on Fosters cans (translated form the Australian).

Julia Gillard
- She seems good, and she is an atheist. Well done Oz.

Desert Frogs
- Eddie Guerrero’s distant relatives, who are better adapted to living in the sand than their Hispanic sibling. They show little intention of following in their kinsman’s pro-wrestling frogsteps.

The Laughing Kookaburra
- Very silly creature. Has little regard for propriety or for the feelings of those nearby. Most often seen around old folks what have done a falling over.

Duck-billed Platypus
- Feline that is frequently charged for the purchase and consumption of mallard meat served on a particular kind of tray.

Oystercatcher
- Bird. Catches oysters.

Cassowary
- Dinosaur-looking turkey-thing.

Moths
- Foul creatures.

Seadragons
- Like seahorses, but several thousand percent more awesome. Seadragons of Oz have been known to have battles on a grand scale with the Skydragons of Zeal. The SeaDs launch themselves from the water, steam coruscating as it hisses around them. They tense their long bodies to points, so as they hit the SkyDs they are utterly skewered, sending hot jets of bahlood all over the ocean. It is a cool thing to watch.

Fairy Penguin
- Benders. Ben-duuuuhs!

Great White Shark
- Evolved form of the Rubbish Beige Shark. Pants.

Sugar Glider
- Little flying squirrel/mouse-looking thing which glides through the air super cool. They are marsupials, which means they like soup from Mars. It is very expensive to ship it in, so they have signed up for Amazon Prime. This is not related to Optimus Prime, who is a Transformer, and not a megalithic online shopping source. Optimus wouldn’t involve himself in such an industry.

Bandicoot
- Popularised by Crash, who was a cartoon one of these. I liked the mask that went “ooga booga!” when you collected it. Ahhhh, those halcyon days; no worries, no concerns. Where did those days go? Now they are lost, forever and irretrievably lost. I am locked in the joyless world of adult life and I cannot escape from my responsibilities. They weigh me down like an albatross around my neck, pain me like a radio in my anus. Why must we live in a world which requires such seriousness? Can we not mess around a little more? Why not dick around? You can’t stop me from dicking around! Who do you think you are, you joyless Jerry Joyce. Heaven above and Tutankamun Almighty! I need to lie down and stop for awhile.

*****

The Smell of a Good Book

Here's this month's ACRE FourThought blog. My contribution is below, and you can follow this link to see the original page with the contributions of the other fellows undertaking this magnificent literary/bloggerary effort.

*****

I have a kindle, I like gadgets, and I embrace progressive technology enabling books to be read in a progressive way. As technology improves, books as a medium will evolve. It was noted on Stephen Fry's Planet Word documentary that as handheld e-readers improve we will see books that incorporate video and extensive footnotes, clips of music and similar. There are already books rife with hyperlinks, and it isn't difficult to imagine the benefits of textbooks where the references in the bibliography lead to the actual articles or papers themselves. These improvements would make studying easier and reading more fun.

Already on the kindle it is possible to see sections of text underlined if they have been highlighted by a number of readers. I'm not sure how I feel about that, hopefully it's a feature that can be turned off; I'd like to come to my own conclusions, and how I read a section of text will definitely be affected if I am aware many people felt it noteworthy.

As much as I enjoy e-readers, for me, personally, they are currently missing something. However this is not informed by practicality or sense, rather it is a hipster coolwank pretention. Much like musos who prefer cds to mp3, and the older who prefer cassette to cd, and the older who prefer vinyl to cassette, and the yet older who prefer music boxes to vinyl, I prefer books. I think it's likely a preference which will take longer to shift culturally, for in comparison to these evolving music recording formats which evolved over a comparatively short period the book has existed in a largely unchanged format for a large number of years.

So, in what ways do books differ to e-readers? In every material dimension the variety of books make them artefacts I delight in, and while the all-in-one nature of e-readers is also something that pleases me, books of paper and ink stimulate so many more of my senses. I have a colossal gospel tome of the Lord of the Rings, with tiny print despite its giant size, a long bound bookmark fraying at the edge, bounteous illustrations taking up entire pages. It is a beautiful book. It frustrates me somewhat as its size excludes it from one of my favourite pastimes: reading in the bath, however it makes up for this by sitting unused for months, years, and then upon re-discovery it has amassed a layer of dust, allowing me to blow it off, imagining that this is an ancient text I have discovered in an ancient ruin or storehouse. On the other end of the scale I have books from the Penguin Popular Classics series, which were printed cheaply in order to make them more available. Old plays and novels have in this way been shrunk into tiny, thin volumes that suit my pastime magnificently. In this way old bastions of literature stand pamphlet sized, and are a far more valuable and rewarding than anything committed to a flyer. I'd be more likely to frequent a pizza place or an indian restaurant which posted The Picture of Dorian Gray around the neighbourhood instead of their own tacky lists of food.

As well as their dimensions, the texture of books are also wildly varied. The plastic smoothness of dustsheets, the childish joy of running your hands over raised title text, like finding a shiny Ole Solskjaer in a packet of stickers. The simple pleasure of running your finger down the edge of the body of pages, watching them flick quickly back, enjoying the whirr of the motion and the breeze created. Joy. There is no better way to up the anticipation of a new journey about to begin within the pages.

But of all our senses, the most strangely powerful is smell. The olfactory stimulus can drag us back in time like no other. Perhaps that's slightly exaggerating; a film watched in childhood rewatched much later can warp us as well, and an album or a song repeatedly listened to can warp us back to the time and place when we hear it years later. For example Ghostbusters 2 turns me into a child as I watch it, and Tenacious D's Tribute takes my back to my teenage bedroom, playing Championship Manager 01/02 on an old PC. But from my experience so many more books can achieve this effect.

And regardless of this effect, I fucking love the smell of a good book. Even the smell of a shit one. I was shocked when I smelt a Twilight book, as despite knowing that it was a collection of written parp, I was shocked to discover that it smelt like a real book. Such is the power of smell, it can positively augment a good book, and it can even cover the reek of a poor book and bestow upon it the credibility of paper, glue and ink.

I recently re-read the first R.A. Salvatore book, The Crystal Shard, and as well as being pleased at how well it stood the test of time and very much enjoying it, I was surprised by its smell. 'Oh yes' I thought, 'this is the smell of fantasy'. And I was surprised by how right I was. Perusing the limited stock I have at my disposal, I am right now smelling Weis & Hickman's Dragon Wing (raised golden title text - delicious) and though it is, of course, the smell of paper, ink and glue, it also smells of fantasy. Also at hand I have Raymond E. Feist's Magician, and it smells exactly the same way. Why should this be!? All these books are from different publishers, and yet they smell exactly the same way. It is as though a secret council of fantasy elders convened and decided "this is how we want fantasy to smell", and so it does.

Koushun Takami's Battle Royale has pages which are unusually white. It has a cold smell, slightly sanitise and lacking in personality. Like a hospital ward or a government building. The cover is a deep red, glossy with a dimpled title. It fits the story magnificently. I have a number of Haruki Murakami books, mostly through the Vintage label, and to me the smell of them is the ultimate smell of comfort. It is the nasal equivalent of putting on the comfiest of pyjamas and hibernating deep in bed. Final Fantasy VII is my gaming equivalent of this. Thanks to the portableness of books, and FF7s release on the PSP I can have this sensation whilst actually in comfy pyjamas and in bed, but I daren't risk it lest I slip into an eternal coma of comfort. Or die as it is also known.

The book which has most moved me nasally recently is Richard Dawkins' The Magic of Reality. Ostensibly a book for older children it is, frankly, utterly majestic. Each page is glossy and rich with colour, and smells of recent redecoration. If you like reading and sniffing paint, I would suggest firstly that you stop sniffing paint, but while you're going cold turkey you can work your way intellectually and olfactorily through this tome. With it's dustsheet off it is a pleasing pale yellow, and at the risk of looking like a lunatic I could very easily simply touch it for an entire hour and be pleased. I would argue that e-readers simply aren't a substitute for that.

E-readers are cool and functional, but they simply don't (yet) have the capacity for exciting me fully in the material world. My kindle doesn't smell of anything. Of course, being human beings we are problem solving animals and we, as we have always done, have thought our way around the problem. We have covers for these e-readers. I have three, for reasons which parallel the Goldilocks tale. One came with the device, a cheap black leather case, and was functional but a little loose and it did not please me. The second, which I bought, was a purple latex sheath which attracted dust like a bugger and was therefore unpleasant to the touch. My final purchase, which so far has pleased me, is a brown hemp cover which is delightful to the touch, and also to the nose.

I am sometimes moving with the times, but I hope that it will be awhile yet until the smell of fantasy is eradicated.

Warm Up

Here's a short film from Peacock and Gamble.  Good fun.

Mind > Words > Hands > Splurge

Lethargic.  It was not his limbs, but his brain that seemed frustratingly wearied.  Little would cajole the ponderous lump to activity, the human mind, the greatest super-computer known, dulled to a stuttering, numb withering in the face of crushing repetition, cyclic tedium.

It was a cruel trick of life that lumped this cynical, jaded creature with a station which surrounded him with the frenzied hysteria of gibbering children.  He did not subscribe to a karmic view of the world, however, and so his situation must be either attributed to a perverse emotional masochism or simple laziness.  Or a blend of the two.

“Turn the volume off, please”, the mumble escaped his barely parted lips, neither a request nor a command, more an automated response which he activated in order to avoid actually engaging with the stubborn, inconsiderate goldfish memory of the whelps whose compliance with the statement was short-lived.  Always short-lived.

Another peal of compressed, digital machinegun fire pierced the room, planned, designed and tweaked to the exact pitch of perfect annoyance by the King of Annoying Bastard Noise himself.

“Turn the volume off”.

The dropped ‘please’ and added edge of further annoyance to the repeated response was met by a swiftly muted computer and a clipped, flippant yelp of “Sorry!” from the offending gibberling.  The chittering of the children dropped out briefly in the wake of the restrained exchange, only the distracted clatter of plates from the café and the steady bass drone of the vending machine scored the room.

The chittering soon returned.  Of course.  The chittering; filled with frantic running-commentary of their internet-use and energetic onomatopoeic outbursts to accompany their gaming exploits.

Even characterising the children as wild mutated creatures or demonspawn no longer offered the slightest amusement, his mind’s bestiary emptied of fresh forms to cast upon them.  He’d realised his mistake early, originally he had assigned a unique fell creature to each child.  This had quickly sapped his creative resources.  Instead, he decided to envision the whole gathering as a large unified group of the same race.  But imagining them as a group of goblins was too much of a disappointment.  The group dynamic was simply too dissimilar to that of a classic goblin raiding party and despite their goblinoid shape and size, and despite how their rough command of the English language fitted his approximation of the goblin common-tongue, he was unable to maintain the complex and fragile illusion within his own head.

He chose, instead, to imagine creative ways in which they could be disposed of.

He envisaged a fireball scorching their ranks, webbing holding them fast until they wasted away and a dual-attack by two great bears, terror washing before them like a tidal wave as their roars preceded their hefty approach.  Numerous scenarios played themselves wonderfully in his head before he even considered the distastefulness of contemplating the annihilation of the young.  Surely something was wrong on a fairly fundamental level in order to be able to enjoy these hypotheticals?

His favourite scenario was one in which he was summoned, or created, an insubstantial creature of roiling mist and wind, which would coalesce suddenly and bare children, like limply flailing rag-dolls, through the glassless windows of the elevated room down into the expansive reception below.

“Volume off”.

The mist creature was imbued with an instinctive and thorough knowledge of philosophical and ethical value, and also wielded the oracular power of divination.  It cast its judgement on each individual in turn, processing and deciding whether or not their lives are, or will prove to be, of any value.  If they are adjudged to be upstanding folk, wholesome and scrupulous, they will pass through unharmed as the mist blows past them.  However, the unwholesome and unscrupulous elements of society will be launched humourously overhead as the mist tornadoes them with its unusual justice.

The moral code against which the creature judges is not wholly known.  What is known is that stupid people get almost-unjustifiably short shrift.  The same is true of people with mean eyes, and those who are able to smirk in a palpably evil way.  Also, individuals who insist on speaking without moving their jaw and make a foolish noise because of it also are punished by the Ethical Mist.  Also, children who refuse to turn the volume off their computers.

“Turn the volume off”.

Wales Shark 002

This is the second video of Wales Shark.  It is about Gareth Bale.  Hopefully it is educational and funny.

TPE 0005: When you are Holding a Hammer, Everything Looks like a Nail

Here is the very fifth installment of my moribund baby.  Look at it.

TPE 0003: The Forbidden Fruit is the Sweetest

Third installment of The Proverbial Experiment.  These videos are my attempt to show commitment to an idea.

Journal of Cannonby: Don't Hate us for the Hiatus

For real.  Here it is once again.


Narrator: Me
Boris: Dafydd
Bevan: Me
Cannonby: Luke
ZX: Me


*****

Journal: The Remarkable Doings of Cannonby
Don't hate us for the hiatus


Narrator
When last we glimpsed our heroes, so many yons ago, they were in a golden suryper of a sticky situation.  The crew were involved in a pincer assault on Vinehaven, a vast castle home to a cannibalistic wine-obsessed cult, partly to rescue the kidnapped the comatose Stephen Teal and Bludonna Snow, and partly to pillage some wine.  The group of Cannonby, Bevan and ZX Ilfracombe led with a full-frontal bombardment, while the espionage team of Boris, Doktor Li Faiseas and Uh Nurse snuck in through concealed tunnels.  In dramatic fashion, Cannonby and co were able to bring down the main gate with the meta-punning use of an explosive petard, while elsewhere, Teal and Bludonna were about to be pulped into manwine by the dreadful Crimson Maude, assisted by the onlooking lackey Hazel.  Now, framed by a distant rumbling of brick and mortar, Boris and Bevan make their escape through the dense forest that envelops Vinehaven, their progress impeded by their hefty cargo, namely the deadweight of the unconscious forms of Stephen Teal and Bludonna Snow.


Boris: I still don't understand what happened back there comrade!


Bevan: It was the petard we hoisted Boris...


Boris: I didn't hoist any petards...


Bevan: Okay, it was the petard I specifically hoisted, it packed a lot more splosion than we... I had anticipated.  Not only did it collapse the main gate, it seems it also buckled the floor, plungling me into the winecellar.


Boris: It must have done more than that!  The entire castle seemed to be coming down!


Bevan: Yes, it seems our actions rocked the place to its very foundations, literally.


Boris: Mmm.  Well as dangerous as it has proved to be now, comrade, it was magnificent timing on your part, no joke!


Bevan: I would say so, yes.  From what I gather Teal and Bludonna would be halfway to the production line had I not intervened.


Boris: glorious, perfect Green Ranger ex machina, swooping in, saving the day...   You didn't have to see what happened though...


Bevan: Well I was reeling a bit from having fallen 20 feet... luckily I landed on my stiff upper lip, and that cushioned a lot of the blow.


Boris:  You should have seen it comrade!  The pillar they were going to use to pulp Bludonna


Bevan: And Teal.


Boris: the pillar came out of it's moorings and smwshed to the ground, oh Bevan, it was awful.  It caught the Doktor and Nurse directly in it's path, and one of the Vinehaven goons!


Bevan: I guessed as much, when I snapped out of my confusion, it was with an astounding swiftness that I realised I was wading through excavated viscera.


Boris: Oh, Cruijff above, what horror.  You know like when a line of blocks disappear in tetris?


Bevan: No, I mean it hasn't been invented yet...


Boris: Well, this was nothing like that it was like a band of furious gorillas brutalising an aisle of lumpy tomato soup!


Bevan:  Peace, Boris.  Let us make good our escape, ere something yet more fearful befall us.


Boris:


Narrator
As the rueful and sombre twosome trudge their way away with their comatose cargo, little do they know their progress is being surveyed by the canny and vengeful eyes of the other winecellar survivor, the sly and vicious Crimson Maude.  Meanwhile!  Back at the now-crumbling castle of Vinehaven, two stoic champions seem unflapped by the structural instability of the stronghold they are looking to scale.  With eyes set firmly at the top, Cannonby begins his ascent.


Cnby: Come, Ilfracombe!  My eyes are set firmly at the top, and I am about to begin my ascent!


ZX: For what possible reason would you decide to ape up this compromised monument?


Cnby: For this is why, follow my reason if you dare!  We're aiming for the figurehead of this organisation, no?  And where would you locate the head-honcho?  Your assumption is correct my cyber-composite super-companion... AT THE TOP!


ZX: Captain, though your enthusiasm would be amusing were I not a robotic construction, I must indicate that the logistical flaws in your reasoning are vast and manifold.


Cnby: Silence!  Your plaintive criticisms, whilst wholly grounded in logic, are but cannonfodder in the blast of my cannonlogic.  I looked up when I was outside, and I saw her, the Headpriestess.  Now, Ilfracombe, I was a face-off on the battlements, and hopefully by the time I get there, there will be a lightning storm aswell.  Now are you to become my tailgate or are you going to stay at the gate with your tail between your legs!?


ZX: Which are we here for Captain, conflict or wine?  It was my understanding that...


Cnby:  BOTH!  Both of course, why simply have your cake when you can have a battle over it and then eat is with some icing on all lovely yum yum!  It seems though you are appearing as ZX, you are seeing the world through the eyes of your ghostly viking companion Ivan.  Hear me well Ivan, gather the wine, I will head up top to make fisticuffs with the head-honcherina, and afterwards we'll have ourselves the most magnificent celebration seen under the sun.  Hold tight, and may Cruijff watch over you.


Narrator
ZX heads down to loot what wine he can find, Cannonby heads up to boot Vino in the behind.  Does Cannonby truly understand the severity of confronting Vinehaven's DreadPriestess, the merciless Mellencamp Vino?  Will ZX's efforts in the collapsing winecellar be as unproblematic as simply stealing some wine?  What plans are currently fermenting in the twisted mind of Crimson Maude?  When you find out, you might not be able to Cannonbelieve it! in the next uterus-tighteningly electrifying instalment of the Tales of Cannonby!


*****


Probably should be mentioned as a footnote that when we read this out Luke farted during one of his lines and this changed the dynamic of the script somewhat.


Why not re-read it and imagine a fart during a Cannonby line and imagine how much funnier it would be?


This'll appear on one of The ACRE Podcasts several months from now in the year 2011.


I entrust you with making your own week enjoyable.

Fill Your Boots

A sketch conceived, or at least workshopped, in a library.  How very inappropriate!  It was, however, filmed in the idyllic and overgrown gullies of the picturesque Rhondda valleys.

Official Alternative Ending to Twilight

Here is our 100% legitimate official alternative ending to the twilight series.  Thanks to H.G. Wells for inspiration and Richard Burton for being badly mimicked.

How To Reintegrate a Soldier

This is the first of our socially-conscious edu-info-tainment sketches.

Late Night Gig Update

Hello everyone, I felt it was my duty to provide feedback and closure on the gig tonight, as I made such a fuss over it.

It went very well, it was a seated crowd so that didn't cause an issue. Luckily, I was introduced with such vigour that the chatting subsided and most people were paying attention when I started, which meant I didn't have to battle to get attention.

I tried a lot of new jokes, as well as finding a use for the pink trilby I bought in Bristol oh so long ago, and also reading some poems. I am very much enjoying spreading myself out creatively. The specific material I did about the charity worked quite well, which is heartening. Its the only time I'll ever do it I imagine, but nice to know that one off writing can still pay dividends.

The bands were amazing, I ran out of the room to hide during Tiger Please, because I knew I had to go back on, so I had to stay in the zone like Ken Shamrock. It was an acoustic set from their guitarist and their singer, with a lot of covers but plenty of their own stuff as well. I am currently listening to their Seasons EP, which is outstandingly accomplished given how young they are. The singer does not look as if he could possibly house the voice he has, and he was lovely when I met him afterwards. I hope they become as massive as they look like they will become, if only so I can have a handy, but lame, claim to fame story.

Magden Audio, the members of which had organised and run the night where worse for wear for drink when they took to the stage, but their barefaced apologies when they messed up amused me greatly. They hit their stride after a few cockups and the energetic headbanging that followed is more tribute to their performance than any sentence of mine could be. They were awesome.

I will likely share some interesting tales from what happened in my next entry, I'll be talking about it on the radio I imagine, though some of it isn't suitable.

I trust you are doing magnificently.

Pip pip.

Also, I got paid £20 for my clowning, I do believe this means that I have 'made it'.

Without Compere

I have been offered a gig as compere on Friday, and so I have spent most of today scrabbling around for information.

I am slightly nervous as to how this gig will go, and while I am hopeful that it could go very well I am prepared for it to be a catastrophe. If I can profess to have a 'style of comedy' without that sounding dickish then I don't think it is overly suited to compering, which is one of the reasons I am so eager to do it. Audience participation hasn't featured very much in my gigs so far, I feel as though the way I perform must make the audience slightly standoffish, it is in a very definite 'I'll talk, you listen' mould. I am trying to be open to new experiences and not turn things down out of an arbitrary preconception that may be founded on nothing. I think that's why our podcasts and sketches (new ones out tomorrow) are slightly frenetic, because we are actively trying so many different ideas and styles. I am really enjoying the experience of turning our hands to different things.

So I spent the afternoon in a mix of researching the Women for Women foundation, which the night is a charity event for, and also scouring forums for advice about compering. Both the Chortle and the Manchester Comedy Forums were a huge help in that regard, as always. Of course it is necessary to sift through some vitriol in order to get to the levelheaded advice but that's the nature of forums I suppose. The advice was essentially that as a compere its essential to keep calm, and to appreciate that every single sentence doesn't have to be a joke, it is more important to create a positive atmosphere than to be considered hilarious. More than the advice being mindblowing I just think the reading of it was a process I needed to go through in order to get in the mindset, although the more practical pieces such as laying out the rules and order of the night etc were invaluable, and flagged up a number of 'well, duh' things that I wouldn't have considered.

The night isn't focused on comedy, and essentially I will be the only comedy element, and I will be introducing two bands. The advice on the subject of compering music gigs was 'Don't', which isn't overly comforting, and my abiding memory of my own personal experience of being on a music bill previously is of a confused and apathetic crowd chatting quietly in front of me. But of course, I know best. This is different to the artsy open mic set up of that gig, but whether or not that'll change this for the better or for the worse, only time will tell. The two bands are Tiger Please and Magden Audio, who I have been checking out since I got home. I am enjoying both of them, which is good, because even if I have a torrid gig I'll get to enjoy them for free. I'll be doing some research on them through the week so that if the crowd really don't want comedy I can just spout something interesting about the bands. Both of the bands are aspirational and fairly professional outfits, which is slightly frightening given that I am being trusted with introducing them. I hope to prove that the organisers blind faith in me is founded by doing my homework and preparing thoroughly, but it will still likely be touch and go until I get up there.

I'm planning to do some material on the charity that the night is for. I figure that since I am getting involved it is the least I can do is a little bit of research, take an interest. I'm hoping that by starting the gig by addressing the charity directly I can contextualise the night, and put people in the 'give some money' mindset. There was mention of me pulling the raffle afterwards so I figure it would be appropriate to actually touch on the charity beforehand. The charity is 'Women for Women' as I mentioned earlier, and the event is called Cycle China, where women go abroad and bike around Beijing (I think, could be Shanghai, will have to check) and get sponsored. I am going to try and play the charity for cheers, get the audience applauding, and also suggest that the women are only taking part for free holidays to China. The charity is run by Professor Robert Winston, who is a face that people would recognise, but not a name, which isn't very useful. He looks like a well-to-do Mario from an alternate dimension. He is allowed to go biking along with the rest of the all-woman group, so I'm going to suggest he has a fetish for sweaty, exhausted bike riding women, and if that goes well I'll suggest he particularly enjoys applying vaseline to the chafing crotches of said women. Fern Britton is also heavily involved with the charity, and on one occasion she went of the fundraiser biking through Jordan. If the stuff about the charity is working I'll say I would have given her a lot more money if she rode Jordan through on a bike, rather than riding through Jordan on a bike. It needs to be phrased better, I'm working on it. I am trying to get charity-specific material because I feel as though just going on as compere and ploughing through the comfortable 10 I have at the moment would be wrong. It could just be a variant on the nerves I get before any gig though, where I feel as though nothing I've ever said or written has been funny and I am about to make a colossal bell of myself.

I have completely failed at audience participation in the past, probably because my act tends to be a self-contained monologue which I then break out of abruptly to ask a question, which ends up with someone in the front row looking blankly and slightly frightened at me. I have just realised it's always a woman aswell, but that says more about my bias in selecting a questionee rather than anything else. Rather than opting for 'where are you from?' / 'what do you do?' questions that are the staple of audience banter, I figured I would go with a 'what bands do you like?' angle, focusing on the music, which is really what people are there for. Given that the bands on the bill are on the indie/rock end of the scale, I am hoping that I will be familiar with most bands that might get shouted out, and if I am I will do my best to do a knobbish impression of them. I was driving home when I decided on that, and I gave myself a headrush from screaming "ghost in the fog!" on the top of my lungs. This was an impression of Cradle of Filth, who I have never really heard, and it is an impression I stole of my ACREolleague Gethin, who is somewhat extreme on occasion.

My only real worry about this gig is that there will be an empty dancefloor in front of the stage while I am on, because I am not overly sure how I would go about bringing people forward, which I would have to do. There's only so long I can be funny to 10 foot of empty space before it becomes pathetic. I spoke to Dafydd about it earlier and he suggested that I would have to follow the example of Matt Price and go out into the audience and corral them directly, which I am not overly eager to do, but perhaps if I wind myself up enough beforehand I would be able to do it well enough.

Hopefully I am being too pessimistic here, but it will prove to be a delicate balance on the night, having to weigh up just how much I would be willing to cajole people into listening to the comedy given that it is a music gig, not wanting to sully it for the bands, but also wanting to keep it bouncing along for the charity end of it aswell. I am really looking forward to the experience.

Worst case scenario is they aren't interested in the comedy and I look like a bellend. I can deal with that. And in that eventuality at least I can take solace that I cared enough to try, and that it is everyone elses fault for being a narrowminded muso.

Of course, that's not going to happen because the gig will be outstanding. How can it not be, with a semi-finalist at the helm?

Yep, It's Still Shining

I probably shouldn't have left it so that my post last week didn't have a conclusion, that was slightly inconsiderate of me. It's the sort of thing that would annoy me as a reader. So my apologies.


The gig went quite well, I did eventually get gonged off because instead of telling jokes I floundered and repeatedly called god a cunt, but in doing so I raised £4 for charity, so maybe there is a god after all. But he is definitely a cunt.


I was able to try out my new story, which was an excellent opportunity as I was then confident enough in it to use on Monday, where I took part in the second heat of the Welsh Unsigned Standup Act competition, which I did really well in, I am through to the semis. I will need to pull my socks up a bit if I want to have any sort of chance in the next round, which is in July.

I think all the fussing and second-guessing that happened last week was definitely worth it, as stressful as it was at the time. It is a process I think I'll have to go through for all new material, just to be certain that I have enough of a grasp on it, although I am hoping that as time goes on the chances of completely blanking like I did in Neath will fall away, eventually becoming 0. I suppose the more material you have the more there is to call upon should things go belly-up. Similarly, the more confident you get as time goes on, the more you'd be able to confidently cover and fill without feeling as though things will crash if you veer from material. Throughout this paragraph I have slowly replaced the term 'I' with the term 'you', I don't know whether this illustrates that my comments are just baseless hypothetical conjecture or whether it's just a trick to distance myself from my own comments.


I automatically use 'you' where I mean 'I' a lot, and it annoys me. It's linguistic trickery, where I remove my agency from the comments, so that it sounds hypothetical and passive, rather than sounding as though it directly involves or represents my opinions.
A little bit of meta-linguistic introspection for you all there, I can only imagine that you are all fascinated and delighted with it.


In only slightly less solipsistic news, we've been slogging away on the sketches, with Hard Reset now joining Just Another Minute on our youtube channel. The feedback we've received has been positive which is great, but I am bracing myself for the eventual, inevitable swathe of 'epic emo gay faggot'-style bile which I figure washes everywhere in the turgid typhoon which is the internet.


When it comes I will say to them (herein referred to as 'The Haters):


Do you know who I am!? I am a Semi-Finalist.


Yes indeed, that'll give them pause for thought.

The Sun Shines Out of Mine

My day today has been coloured by a constant niggling level of nerves, due to having a gig in Swansea tonight.


I've written new stuff to flesh out my set, and been occupying myself by running and re-running through the set in my head, recording it and replaying it to myself and making a bullet point list of the running order of it in a series of tedious attempts to remember it.


My all-in attitude to memorising this new stuff comes from having blanked completely during my last gig and being left on stage open-mouthed and silent, looking like a grade-a bellend, and no mistake.


I've reverted to my old tactic of attempting to mesh the material in a (perhaps somewhat contrived) narrative flow, so that it is less staggered, and therefore, in theory, easier to remember. It seems to be working so far, and actually outlining the blow-by-blow of the material (this is a pun given the nature of the set, so I will titter to myself) has helped no-end in committing it to memory. Of course all this blathering might be hugely premature, only time will tell. I also plan on putting the bullet points on my hand before I go on, which I've not done before, but I think it's necessary, I want at all costs to avoid the complete blank that happened before.


I am a lot happier with the new material than I was with the stuff I had planned to say before I blanked, which I think will also be a lot of help. Being genuinely enthused by the things you want to say is likely a much better catalyst than trying to remember a story that you think people are going to react badly to. I also hadn't learnt it well enough.


This entry has devolved quite quickly into anxious hypothesising, it is essentially the blogging equivalent of rubbing palms together or biting your fingernails.


So in a slight change of focus, I am quite awed by how difficult it must have been to attend far-flung nights without the aid of e-mail, satnav and google maps. I have a spot tonight in a bar which I've never visited, and despite this I not only know exactly where it is, thanks to google maps, I also know where I'm going to park, as well as being aware of several alternatives should those spaces be full.


I am very grateful for all this technology, if I had to potter around Swansea by myself looking for the venue on the night, I think I would be reduced to a gibbering nervous wreck. Even as it is I am not wholly comfortable with the process, I get infused with a mix of excitement, of feeling very grown up indeed, and then with an acute feeling of being very clearly outside my comfort zone, which probably isn't hugely conductive when I am attempting to remember a new story I plan on telling.


I'm sure the only answer is to heed the advice that the Pub Landlord would surely give, which is to SNAP OUT OF IT!


The gig tonight starts quite late, so I am confident that I'll get there with plenty of time to spare, and I will use the time beforehand wisely, running through my set like I should have done before, where instead I sat staring into the middle-distance like a vacant dolt. That's right, a dolt.


This blog is a burst of rampant solipsism, I must apologise. Hopefully it hasn't been too nauseating getting to see the view of the inside of my brain, which seems to be lodged squarely up my own arse.


This has been an exercise in releasing nervous energy, if it's not enough I will have to torture a kitten or something, who knows.


Expect a blow-by-blow post mortem of the gig tomorrow. Actually, don't.

First Sketch

As you may or may not know, I am a part of a sketch troupe called The ACRE.

We are on community radio every weekend, and we edit the best bits into The ACRE Podcasts, because we are awful modern. Apart from these endeavours, we also write blogs and do live stuff when we can. We are basically creative busybodies, and hopefully we're reaching the point where our idle speculation regarding things we should do has been overtaken by actually doing those things.

Which brings me on to the point of this entry.

We spent a very sunny yesterday in the bustling township of Pontypridd, where we hauled ourselves to a pub with cameras and ideas to come up with a sketch and film it in a couple of hours. We figured the only way we'd get past the planning/potential stages of the thing would be to just go and do it, even if that means a haphazard sketch. It would be a learning curve and an experience which hopefully we could build on.

And that's what happened.

We journeyed into Ponty Park, and took to filming a sketch, the brief of which was Dafydd saying "I want to be up a tree protesting". I am surprised we managed to fill 4 minutes of nothing really.

The end product is a lot punchier and crisper than we expected it could be when we were filming, but the magnificence of editing is that some semblance of narrative can be tricked into place even if there was none at the time of filming.

So here it is, it is full of needless swearing, because we are mature, and it is incredibly silly. We hope it makes you laugh.

www.theacre.net

@adamgilder

acrecomedy@gmail.com

Cooking Dynamo

I am betrayéd.

Having spent the most of this week floundering about watching sitcoms, listening to podcasts, reading books, playing games and gorging hideously on any foodstuff I can be arsed to put into my mouth, I, perhaps unsurprisingly, find myself in a creative slump.

I don't know whether the decadent activities listed above took place because of this slump, or whether the slump has been brought on by the activities, in all probability it is a symbiotic mix of the two. I have destroyed my eyes by staring for hours at my laptop screen, slogging my way through a gruelling and brain numbing re-design of The ACRE website, brought on by needing to incorporate the amazing new logos designed for us by Heather of HLW Design onto the site. It was fiddly work for me, as I am fairly clueless about such things, and even with the aid of iWeb (the web design equivalent of a tricycle with stabilisers) it took me many long hours. Dragging and clicking. Urgh.

But with bleeding eyes I can take solace that the website now looks far more professional, with many thanks to Heather for designing the logos and the banners, and for not complaining over the vagueness of my ideas or the tardiness of my replies. They are class.

The website is teal as well now. I fucking love teal.

So back to the betrayal.

Having been stuck in a fug, unable to force out any of the latent creativity I have sloshing around inside myself somewhere, it was there last time I looked at least, I decided to be pro-active and make myself something to eat, rather than just stare at a blank text window gurning in anxiety and frustration.

The "meal" I settled on was slapdash, a mix of unusual plate-fellows. However, I learnt everything I know from mawkish idealistic RPGs and superheroic epic tales, and I figured that a ragtag band of culinary heroes would do better than a tactically sound, well gelled team. I was wrong.

Not only was I wrong, but I was also blighted by a plague of misfortunes throughout the cooking process.

The backbone of my meal was to be a cod fillet in breadcrumbs. My meat preference is usually chicken, but given that I need to kickstart my brain, I figured some "brain-food" would be the smartest option. I slapped the fillet into a baking tray, and ferried it into the oven. No problem, I am an oven veteran. It was a flawless move.

I am a huge fan of potato, but given that chips, or some variant thereof, makes up the vast majority of my potato intake, I decided I would change tack, and go slightly exotic. Microwave mash in no way fills the bill in terms of 'exoticity', but that's what I cooked. I say 'cooked'. This pot of microwave mash is said to serve two, and though i am something of a pig, I decided I would abstain from eating the entire lot. However, cutting a patty of refrigerated mash potato in half ranks quite high up in my league of 'Pathetic Things I Did Today'. Having to move the wad of mash into a different bowl also scores highly. In a world where people still starve, I cannot find another human being willing to split mash with me.

I would have been happy with my plate of mash and fish. I decided to compliment the meal with some apple squash. As it turns out, the apple squash was the only item whose consumption went to plan. it was lovely squash.

The mash reacted badly to being microwaved in a different container. It grew a burnt crusty skin around itself, which was off-putting, to say the least. And fucking disgusting, to react dramatically. I was disgruntled, and returned to the oven to reclaim what I imagined would be the saving grace of my mealtime, a delicious piece of fish to offset the filthy mash.

But oh, no. Oh very no.

I had been tricked by my father's penchant for keeping food in non-labelled freezer bags. What I had though to be a heavenly cod in breadcrumbs was, in fact, something altogether more sinister. It is said that the devil makes work for idle hands, and I imagine that the work those idle hands undertook resulted in the invention of this satanic invention.

Chicken kiev.

My entire day lay in ruins on my plate. My tears of humiliation lubricated the crusty mash, the chicken kiev postured damply by its side, like the lewd length of moist meat that it was.

I turned to some simple bread and butter for solace. Its purity and simplicity washed away the surface torment of the freakish mash and the licentious chicken kiev, restoring some measure of dignity to my evening.

I am clean again, but I can't be certain that the scars will ever fade away.

www.theacre.net

@adamgilder

Journal of Cannonby: The Battle at Chi Ki

I am hoping that the plot is thickening somewhat in Cannonby of late. At the very least I can say that there is at least an overarching plot nowadays, rather than just silly throwaway one offs. Of course everything in The ACRE Podcasts are throwaway, but the genius is we don't throw them away. Is it genius? Who knows, eh?

The script was read/played by:

Narrator: Me

Cannonby: The Pirate

Bevan: Me

Boris: Dafydd Evans

Doktor: The Pirate

Hazel: Me

Maude: Dafydd Evans

*****

Journal: The Remarkable Doings of Cannonby

The Battle at Chi Ki.

Narrator

So, here we are again, dear friends; in the weird and wonderful world of Captain Cannonby and his curmudgeonly crew. That is perhaps slightly too jolly an opening given the situation the crew find themselves in. Teal and Bludonna have been captured slash kidnapped by the borderline vampiric, certainly cannibalistic priests of Vinehaven. These priests, lead by their Head Priest; the buxom, glamorous and oddly melodic Mellencamp Vino, plan on mwshing their captives to wine. Her able aides; Crimson Maude, head of torture and winemaking, and Hazel Sick, the oddsbody, ferret Teal and Bludonna away to the dungeons to that very end. While the Doktor, the Nurse and Boris search for an obligatory hidden secret entrance, Cannonby has sided for a more direct approach, and has dragged Bevan and a still slightly damaged ZX Ilfracombe along with him. Can the verb 'to storm' be aptly used to describe the behaviour of three men? I'm not overly certain but that's what it says here, so; Cannonby, Bevan and ZX storm the main gate.

CNBY: All for one, one for all, oye you two! Make a hole in the wall!

BEVAN: Ah, marvellous. What a magnificently nuanced plan of action you've compiled there Captain. With a tactician as Machiavellian as you, how could we possibly fail?

CNBY: Don't you spout your clever cloggery at me Carmarthen Bevan! I remember when you were but a babe in arms, I USED TO CHANGE YOUR NAPPIES, MY BOY!

BEVAN: Well that's absolute rubbish, I am significantly older than you, rendering what you just said absolutely impossible.

CNBY: Since when are you older than me?

BEVAN: Since the beginning, obviously. I think if you go back and check the character biographies that were drawn up at the start of these stories you'll see it clearly stated that I am older. I was mean't to be something of a mentor figure I believe.

CNBY: Well that turned out fantastically didn't it!?

BEVAN: I am the figure of sense at least, I am the earth wire to your cattle prod.

CNBY: That's not mentoring though is it?

BEVAN: It is mentoring of a sort.

CNBY: It's just misanthropy!

BEVAN: No, it's good old fashioned common sense, like we used to get when I was but a boy.

CNBY: I trust that since we're spending so long discussing your age that a twist in this plotline will eventually hang on that information?

BEVAN: I very much doubt it, I just thought it was a necessary thing to thrash out. Accuracy is important, especially to people of my advancing age.

CNBY: Old people are tedious.

BEVAN: But to reiterate, we aren't going to be able to smash through this colossal gate, not even with ZX's freakish cyborg might. Do you have any other strategically simplistic ideas?

CNBY: We could set fire to the place. With all the alcohol in there it should go up like a bonfire in a petrol station forecourt.

BEVAN: While your use of simile which involves buildings and technologies which don't exist in our reality is wonderful, I am afraid to say that won't work. Wine isn't flammable, really.

CNBY: Is that a bit of wisdom garnered over the years?

BEVAN: No, I just wikipediad it to check. Factual accuracy in these stories are important you know. Anyway, even if all the vines that cover the place went up in a fire, you'd run the risk of killing Teal and Bludonna as well as all the priests.

CNBY: Oh yes. I forgot they were in there. You asked for strategies and I just thought FIRE! you know? That's what all the great strategists go for.

BEVAN: I suppose you have a point. Renowned strategist and ancient-Agian Warlord Lu Xun often used fire in his tactics.

CNBY: Fascinating. Usually at this point we would have a cheap reference to some kind of video game, but this week you've decided to opt for referencing a literary pseudo-historical figure, it's more upmarket and makes us look clever, I like it.

BEVAN: Nah, I saw him on Dynasty Warriors.

CNBY: Typical.

Narrator

I've taken down an officer! That's what they say on that game. Away from Cannonby and Bevan's bickering, Boris, the Doktor and Uh Nurse are having a more fruitful experience. I'll point out now that that was a pun, because by the time they actually come into contact with fruit you'll have forgotten the line about it being 'fruitful'.

BORIS: So where is this hidden opening?

DOKTOR: Patience my little Slavic buddy, you need to cast your eyes amongst the little oval shapes / You'll find the secreted opening amongst the grapes.

Narrator

Okay, I suppose it wasn't that long before the fruits came up, I just got a bit excited, didn't want a joke to slip through the net. Skies know they are few and far between in these tales.

BORIS: Is this the entrance here? It looks a lot like one I guess.

DOKTOR: Yes.

BORIS: That was easy, I expected that to be really drawn out and tedious. Small blessings I suppose.

Narrator;

Very nearby, on the other end of the tunnel lies the dungeon labyrinth that is the underguts of Vinehaven, wherein Crimson Maude and Hazel are making the preparations for the evening's winemaking.

MAUDE: What're you doing with those comatose carcasses Hazel, get your patootie in gear woman, skies above!

HAZEL: Yes, Miss Maude.

MAUDE: Chuck 'em in the big trough as usual, I'll start up the giant foot machine which will begin the crush. We'll have ourselves some wine in no time.

HAZEL: Yes, Miss Maude.

Dragging noises and banging as though people have been dumped in the trough.

MAUDE: Spiffing. Let's throw the switch!

Narrator

*Sharp breath* Are they really going to do it? Having escaped the dangers of the forest and the clutches of an Agian Spider, will Teal and Bludonna be cursed to a fate where they are splattered by a colossal mechanised foot? In their unconscious state there is little they can do to help themselves. Will Cannonby break the gate? Will Boris arrive in time? Why has no one ever said 'Gyargh!' in these stories? Aren't they mean't to be pirates? There's not even a wooden leg or a parrot. Skies above, this is one of the most cliche-free pirate stories ever. And one of the worst. But now you have to come back or you'll never know if Bludonna and Teal get wineificated. It'll be like Schrodinger's Liquidation/Cannibalism Machine Theory. That's not very catchy so you'd better come back next week, to discover what transpires in Tales of Cannonby!

*****

New script as always will be read/played tomorrow halfway through our 12-3pm GMT slot on www.rhonddaradio.com.

Cannonby will be going on hiatus when this arc concludes I believe. What will we fill it with I wondread?

If you feel a pressing need to get in touch send your missives to acrecomedy@gmail.com or tweet @adamgilder.

Fanks all.

Adam