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).

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).

So bad am I at self-promotion that not only have I not mentioned on this dusty old blog that I’m performing at the Edinburgh Fringe this year, I don’t think I’ve even mentioned that I’ve been doing stand-up comedy. But I am, so that’s cleared that up.

I’m not planning to do a day-by-day reportage of my showbiz Embra lifestyle (last night I was out until half 11 and knocking back diet coke like there was no tomorrow, and there was a tomorrow and I know because that’s where I am now) but that’s how it will begin because it’s all new and shiny and I have tiny anecdotes to share.

I travelled up on Wednesday – that’s the eponymous Day 1. Using my special geek powers, I procured for myself an advanced purchase first class ticket at a very reasonable price and sat back on the train while the nice people from National Express East Coast poured free food down my gullet at regular intervals. I must’ve had 25% of the ticket cost back in complimentary meals. I didn’t even need dinner later on.

My best laid plans to use those four-and-a-bit hours of the journey to do something productive – read a book, revise my set, listen to podcasts, write material – failed completely. I flicked through a free copy of The Independent, completed 65% of the crossword, listened to my iPod on shuffle and sat back waiting for the next delivery of gratuitous grub.

Within two hours of arriving in Edinburgh, I’d seen five people I knew, including meeting a friend who lives in Edinburgh in the queue for the very first show I’d booked. That says less about my dubious connectedness and more about the nature of the Edinburgh ecosystem.

I have rather overdone going to see shows the first few days here but they’re in preview and therefore much cheaper. Using my awesome spreadsheet skills (all right, so I can’t do pivot tables), I optimised savings and did a bit of critical path analysis to allocate shows to the optimum days for the most efficient use of time. In doing so, I saved £45 off the full price tickets, although this was slightly undermined by putting one of the carefully planned shows in my calendar for the wrong day and missing it. C’est la vie.

What I learnt today: Central Edinburgh is loud. Where I’m staying is loud. Sleeping is hard.

Recommended show: Colin Hoult’s Inferno

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).

Tuesday’s show started well and got progressively better through the day.

“More poofery”

Like Richard Herring, Stewart Lee and Simon Munnery, David Benson is an act I see every year if he’s on. His shows tend to be gentle but entertaining, well-suited for mid-afternoon in a rainy Edinburgh, and he has a charismatic, conversational style that lends itself to whatever subject he chooses to cover.

David Benson Sings Noël Coward is this year’s show and it was the subject matter rather than Benson’s performance that let me down a little. He was more entertaining between songs than some of the songs themselves, although there were a few gems mixed in, particularly a “lost” song about the middle classes and an extra verse to Mad About the Boy.

“We’re the hip-op generation”

I didn’t realise when booking to see Barry Cryer and Ronnie Golden that it would be another song-based show, and I wondered in passing whether Coward, if around now, would also be penning songs about the Freedom Pass. (Probably not.)

73-year-old Barry Cryer is a national institution and trotted out various funny anecdotes between songs. He shared the stage with his 60-year-old junior Ronnie Golden, whose varied guitar playing, mimicry skills and huge vocal range were very impressive.

I’m always a little dismissive of comedy songs on the basis that you can get away with being less funny in song than in straight standup, and Barry Cryer’s stories were sometimes funnier than the songs either side. One slightly mean-spirited song didn’t impress me at all, but it was offset by the highlight, a particularly funny flamenco number. Overall, there were more hits than misses.

“Why is he on a unicycle?”

The Jonny and Joe Show, featuring Jonny Sweet and Joe Thomas, is at the anarchic end of the sketch show spectrum. Oxbridge graduates (would you believe it?) like Tommy and the Weeks (excuse for a plug: I saw their very good Edinburgh preview in London – go see) and with a similarly strong dynamic, their surreal show is a fast mix of fun sketches that come out of nowhere and are abruptly discarded as soon as they’re finished with.

While not often hysterical, the sketches were always amusing, the whole thing performed with marvellous precision and a consistently fun and flowery use of the English language. Jonny Sweet in particular seems blessed with the ability to make any physical action or line of dialogue funny just by his performance, while Joe Thomas’s stiller, slightly harsher character provides a good counterpoint. Despite being scarily young, both have made their TV comedy debuts and, based on this show, will go far.

You can watch some of their videos from last year on Project V.

“McCain’s not Able”

The last show of the day was Tina C., Christopher Green’s country singer creation, in Tick My Box, a rally for her campaign to be President of the US of A.

Green’s been playing Tina C. so long, it’s a polished performance, maintaining the character even when ad libbing (my question about sub-prime lending and the global economic crisis during the audience Q&A got a quick and funny response).

Complete with line dancing troupe The Tumbleweeds and mixing character standup with comic songs (including a duet with fellow country music spoofer Wilson Dixon) and obligatory audience participation (it’s a rally, after all), Tina C. makes for a fun end to an evening at the Festival.