Edinburgh cold? Already? (Day 3)

There is a legendary disease they speak of in the ancient annals of that mysterious ceremony called the Edinburgh Fringe, known as The Edinburgh Cold.

With mind-numbing inevitability, a host of comedians - who have spent every night breathing the air of 50 or more strange people in a hot, humid, airless room, and shaking hands, air-kissing and giving each other bear hugs in the streets, at launch parties, and into the early hours in equally packed bars, and, in some cases, handing hundreds of flyers out to the great unwashed on the streets of the city - are suddenly surprised to find they’ve picked up some germs.

Dear reader, I am among that number.

Because of my religious regime of consuming slices of raw garlic washed down with orange juice every day, I seek normally to protect myself from this ailment. But by midday Thursday - Day 2 of my show - I had a sore throat and realised I had succumbed to something. 

I managed the second night of my show fine, though they were a funny crowd who seemed not to get a lot of gags, and who laughed most at things like the bloke in the back row who kept shouting out the names of random superheroes (to be honest that was very funny, but it slightly derailed the rest of the hour. We finished on time though, so the day’s editing had paid off in shortening the show).

This morning, Friday aka Day 3, I wake to find the Socks Voice is currently frayed. It has a reedy, two-pronged sound to it, which is not a good thing. I will have to spend the day nursing that voice and being kind to myself. That or we’ll be doing our first Friday night show as a mime.

It could be worse, I could be doing a Comic Art Masterclass in the daytime tomorrow as well as hoping for a sellout show that night. 

In other news, at yesterday’s Gilded Balloon launch party I learned that the reason there aren’t so many big name TV comedians at Edinburgh this year is that they’ve all been playing at the Just For Laughs Festival. They have, apparently, been going there because that’s where Netflix are going to shop for talent, and they’re not coming to Edinburgh. So if you’re angling for a TV special, you do a week in Canada instead of a month in Edinburgh. Where the biggest thing you’re going to pick up is strep throat.

The Award Winning* Scottish Falsetto Sock Puppet Theatre are Superheroes at The Gilded Balloon at the Edinburgh Fringe from August 1st to 26th - STARTS TONIGHT! 

*Winners of the Bath Comedy Festival Lovehoney Best Joke Award 2018