As Dan and I left the Pleasance Dome in the early hours of Day 5, he pointed out the poster for the Amused Moose Comedy Awards Showcase.

“Are you on that?” he asked.

“Yes, I should be,” I replied. I remembered quite clearly doing the photoshoot, alongside a host of other comedians, so I should be on the poster – unless my awkward smile had been cropped out or a more famous comic’s head had been photoshopped onto my body.

Neither of these things had happened and there I was, on a poster. Wearing exactly the same clothes in the photo as I was wearing stood looking at the photo. And I honestly have more than one set of clothes. And have been alternating.

We don’t do shows on Sundays so I took the opportunity to see one of the acts that clashes with ours, The Gentlemen of Leisure (the old GOL). Partway into their show, I realised with increasing horror that I had left my vital umbrella in the bar, hanging off the end of a table to dry out.

I figured there were three possible futures: I would leave the show, find my umbrella where I had left it and head out into rainy Edinburgh with my trusty anti-precipitation shield (umbrella); I would leave the show, see my umbrella had gone, retrieve it from the kindly bar staff and head out into rainy Edinburgh with my trusty anti-precipitation shield (umbrella); or I would leave the show, see my umbrella had gone, find no trace of it and head out into rainy Edinburgh with no protection from the precipitation (I would get wet).

It turned out to be the first one.

I went along to Tricity Vogue’s Ukulele Cabaret in the evening to see my old schoolmate Ben playing uke (obv). He’s had a ukulele for two months and is incredibly deft with it – he can play separate strings and everything. I’ve had mine for two years and still just bash chords. Though, as Ben pointed out to me, he’d been playing guitar for 15 years first – whereas I “play” the ukulele specifically because I can’t play the guitar.

Spent the rest of the evening geeking out with Dan and Tom from the Gentlemen of Leisure (the old GOL). Surrounded by the beautiful people of Brooke’s Bar, I suspect we were the only ones setting each other quiz questions and discussing our favourite episodes of modern Doctor Who. We are pretty cool.

What I learnt today: The first mobile phone call in the UK was made by Ernie Wise. (Thanks, Tom.)

Recommended shows: The Gentlemen of Leisure Present: The Death of the Novel and Superbard and the Sexy Quantum Stories.

Obligatory plug: I’m in Three Man Roast, 2.35pm weekdays and Saturday 20th at Finnegan’s Wake on Victoria Street – free entry. Also at the Amused Moose Comedy Awards Showcase at the Pleasance Dome, 4pm on August 17th (book online).

I trudged through the pretty incessant rain yesterday to register for the gym but their computer was down so I went away again and had a nap.

But then I went back later and registered. Take that, expectations.

The Pleasance gym is, it turns out, pretty nice. On the youthspeak spectrum that runs from “gay” to “sick”, it is definitely sick. Which means good. While gay, entirely erroneously and with more than a whiff of homophobia, means bad. I don’t make the rulez.

A gym man took me on a tour. He showed to the CV area (where I would late resume my exercise – geddit?) and then led me to a room full of giant barbells and giant men.

“I don’t know if you’re interested in these sorts of weights…?”

“Yeah, well, er, y’know… No, no. Just the little ones.”

I did 3.5 miles on the treadmill, accompanied by one of the special running playlists I’ve set up on my iPod. Nerdcore hip hop for the win.

Dashed off to see a show, had a big dinner (the gym had left me on negative calories for the day – I’m counting) and then came back to my room to do some writing.

I’d been pondering a stand-up idea that, if I could pull it off, would be the most awesome piece of stand-up comedy ever written. I may be underselling it. I imagined it would take at least the rest of my time up here, absorb my every waking thought and slowly drive me insane. I pictured Mozart at the end of Amadeus, frantically scribbling to complete my magnum opus, Salieri looking on jealously, wishing he was as funny, but he isn’t because he’s a composer so he should stick to what he knows and butt out.

Finished the first draft in a couple of hours. I should’ve been pleased but I was slightly disappointed. It was too easy to be awesome. It wasn’t even that funny, although that can be an overrated way of measuring comedy. It was just some words, albeit in a spreadsheet. You know you’ve written a complicated script when you had to do it in Excel.

Still, it did mean that I’d got that displacement activity out of the way (hello, blog) and I could get back to the writing I’m supposed to be doing up here.

So I popped out for a drink at midnight and got to bed at 4. Welcome to Edinburgh.

What I learnt today: The most important item I packed was my umbrella. Ella. Ella. Eh. Eh. Eh.

Recommended show: Dan Antopolski, Tom Craine & Nat Luurtsema: Jigsaw

Obligatory plug: I’m in Three Man Roast, 2.35pm weekdays and Saturday 20th at Finnegan’s Wake on Victoria Street – free entry. Also at the Amused Moose Comedy Awards Showcase at the Pleasance Dome, 4pm on August 17th (book online).

I really am going to register for the gym today. But first, a blog post.

For our second show, we definitely wanted people to come and watch. (For future reference, this applies to all of our shows. Please come.) One of the traditional, desperate ways to entice people to your show is by handing our flyers.

As a bubbly extrovert who loves meeting new people, chatting to strangers and generally interacting with humanity at large, I love flyering.*

I bagsied the Royal Mile while the other two-thirds of my show, Dan and Alex, covered the environs of our venue and the Grassmarket respectively. I figured the Royal Mile would be an easier place to give out flyers as people there expect it, what with it being always jam-packed with flyererers (and incessant street performance) throughout August.

This turned out to be the flaw in my plan because the sheer number of other people promoting their shows (or working for promoters promoting other people’s shows) made it more difficult to target genuine potential audience – who themselves were mixed in at lunchtime with the unfortunate locals fighting their way briskly through the crowds, making their way back to the drudgery of their desks from the drudgery of Greggs. (I worked in Edinburgh for two years. I have the utmost sympathy for anyone based in the city centre during the Festival.)

Of course, some of the other flyererererers are potential audience members so I did a bit of flyer swapping here and there.

It was during one such exchange that I encountered the Rotter. She was walking up the Mile in a small group of young women.

“Free comedy?” I asked meekly, proffering a flyer for our show.

“I’ll swap,” said the Rotter, holding out her flyer.

“Cool,” I said, taking it and holding my own.

“Nah, don’t want it now,” she said and hurried off, giggling with her friends like this was the cleverest stunt ever pulled. Percy Blakeney must have been in awe.

What a rotter. I could have felt angry. I could have felt cheated. I could have felt embarrassed to have been made to look a fool right at the heart of the Edinburgh Fringe. But then no-one else had noticed and all I could think was what a rubbish thing to do that was.

Not because it was mean. It was, and thoroughly against the imagined spirit of the blah blah blah, but it just rather missed the point of flyering.

We hand out flyers because we want people to come to our shows. (Please come.) Why would I go to her play now? I was standing there, looking at her flyer thinking “Yep, of all the shows currently on, this is the one I’m definitely not going to.” So she’s a flyer down – a flyer her theatre group will have paid for specifically to get people through the door – and I’ve lost nothing. What’s more I have, let’s face it, some social media skillz. I could have been on twitter in seconds, hashtagging my tweet to buggery, declaring her play “One star. An appalling mess. To be avoided.” Or worse: two stars. Not even bad enough to be noteworthy. That would have been most unethical having not actually seen the show but I’ll admit I was tempted.

I shan’t name her play here – I’m just too nice and frankly she doesn’t deserve the exposure.

And anyway, our show an hour later was packed so I think I got the last laugh there.

*In case you don’t know me: this is the opposite of true.

What I learnt today: I’m a nicer person than I thought I was.

Recommended show: Andrew Bird’s Village Fete

Obligatory plug: I’m in Three Man Roast, 2.35pm weekdays and Saturday 20th at Finnegan’s Wake on Victoria Street – free entry. Also at the Amused Moose Comedy Awards Showcase at the Pleasance Dome, 4pm on August 17th (book online).

Day 2 was Day 1 for our show.

The paid shows tend to spend a couple of days doing cheaper previews while the performers settle into their venue, sort out their teching, etc. Free shows are warming up in the same way but because we’re already free, we can’t, except in a pedantic mathematical way, be half price.

Our plan, though, was to treat the first show as a bit of a run-through. We wouldn’t go flyering and while it would be nice to have an audience (no peering over a gift horse’s equine mandible here), we didn’t expect one. It would be a bit rough around the edges.

Turns out we were half-full and had a reviewer in. Pretty sure there’s a moral there.

Our venue is surprisingly nice. When we were bidding for a room, I was just hoping for somewhere that didn’t look like a body would be found walled up there in Jonathan Creek. We’re at the back of a pub and I was anticipating a heavy curtain separating us from the bar. In fact we’ve got a proper room with a stage and spotlights and doors and that. The pub itself is recently refurbished and the bar staff have all been really helpful.

The first show was a bit rusty then but there were plenty of laughs and I think this whole thing may actually work.

What I learnt today: Always be prepared. Dib dib dib.

Recommended shows: John-Luke Roberts and Nadia Kamil: The Behemoth and Humphrey Ker is Dymock Watson: Nazi Smasher!

Obligatory plug: I’m in Three Man Roast, 2.35pm weekdays and Saturday 20th at Finnegan’s Wake on Victoria Street – free entry. Also at the Amused Moose Comedy Awards Showcase at the Pleasance Dome, 4pm on August 17th (book online).