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I seem to be getting better finally and without medical intervention, proving once and for all that doctors are a fraud. They just wait til you're better and then pretend it was them that did it. That testicle would have migrated out of my body itself if they'd just let me be.
Still a bit snotty and coughy but the fatigue seems to have gone, just in time for the filming of "Can I Have My Ball Back?" at the Gordon Craig Theatre in Stevenage, which also had the benefit of being about 10 minutes from my house by train and a fair of only £3.90 (and I saved myself a further £2 by sitting in first class, along with some rowdy school boys who I am fairly confident had also not paid for this privilege - no hope for the future when young people break the law like this). I wondered about the kind of person who would pay the extra for first class for a journey of just a few minutes and decided fairly quickly that they would be an arse. But the option was there. I also noticed that if I used my Network Rail card which usually saves money, but only over a certain value of ticket, the journey would cost me £13. The machine helpfully asked if I'd prefer to pay £13 or £3.90. Is there anyone who would willingly go for the higher amount? Maybe the machine can make that decision for you.
It's a while since we've filmed RHLSTP so it was cool to have some of the crew back together for this job. Chris Evans (not that one) was there and it's always worth being reminded that all the stuff that we've achieved in the last two decades would never have happened if he hadn't taken it upon himself to start filming the stand up shows of comedians he liked. Tonight we had a dry ice machine and a spotlight and were in a big theatre (albeit one that was more than half empty), which was some step up from the (still wonderful) Chapter Arts in Cardiff. He's a spectacularly incompetent man which makes his achievements all the more incredible.
I met some of the kind folk who had backed the kickstarter at the top level before the show and they had their photos taken with me and Right Bollock. Most of them were bearded men who worked in IT (I am assuming) but a couple had somehow managed to find life partners and brought them along. The partners were, I think, generally quite confused about who I was and what was going on. One wife ended up with Right Bollock resting on her shoulder for the photo and that seemed a strange way to meet someone for the first time. She took it in good spirits. I suspect she has to indulge her husband's unusual interests quite a lot. She was unphased.
I went out with the crew for Wagamamas before the show, which was a lot of fun, but not part of my usual solitary routine and maybe I didn't quite get in the right mindset ahead of the performance (and was also full of chilli squid) or maybe I was just a bit nervous about this being the show that was committed to film or maybe my brain is a bit befuddled by the lurgy, but I felt a half beat off the pace to begin with. I'd foolishly not practised going back and forth to the table for water and to put the clicker down and it was in the wrong place which made it hard to get to gracefully and the script was coming into my head at the last possible second. I made a few unforced errors (though went back to pick most of them up) and it just wasn't quite as crisp as I can sometimes manage, BUT it went down well with the Stevenage crowd who enjoyed me mocking this toilet of a town and showing off that I lived in Hitchin. Chris Evans (not that one) will make it look brilliant I know and I am sure that no one would notice what I perceived as sub-par performance, but I wasn't quite as immersed in the space as I sometimes feel and there was the tiniest bit of self-consciousness that this was a performance.
In fact I challenge you to buy the download and even with the knowledge that this my internal monologue, to be able to spot anything amiss. Maybe if you look deep into my eyes so you can see my soul.
Look, this is me being very picky. It was all good, but it felt like a bit of an out of body experience for me. Everyone else seemed to think it was a great show. Which I think it is. You want the film version to be the best it can be. I was generally much happier with the second half, though I kept getting things slightly mixed up and was annoyed that I leapt forward a bit in one joke that I've never got wrong. Could I go back and rescue it? I did a half-arsed attempt and it weighed on my mind for more time than it should have done.
The tour is nearly over and we have the show on film (well on digital cards) and I am delighted about that and I also know that it's going to be way better than I am making it sound (I am just slightly fascinated by the internal monologue of the performer and how sometimes a show is almost instinctive and sometimes you are plagued by a self-destructive heckler - though I let him out into the open in this show with Right Bollock).
We will get to work on all the kickstarter extras and I think it will all be with you in November if God is willing. We'll be selling downloads then too for those of you foolish enough not to back us. I think, on balance this might be my best show and it's almost certainly the most consistently funny one. Rolling that ball out twice more -
in Salisbury on Friday and in Bristol on 1st June.
My guest for the Chesham RHLSTP on 24th May at 1pm will be Esther Manito.
Tickets here. 
