Fringeiness
Last night was my one night of the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. My husband and I planned to go to a bunch of shows all in one night in order to get completely burned out on the festival and therefore have no insane ideas of visiting the city center during the rest of the festival. I believe that it worked.
I'll start with my trip into the city. I had taken the day off work so I could sleep in and get some other stuff done at the same time. I was planning to head into the city at 1:30. I had an eye doctor appointment related to my upcoming laser eye surgery scheduled for 3:00, and it normally takes less than an hour to get to the city center, but it is the festival and my husband informed me that there was a major fire at a kilt shop on Princes Street, so the buses were running late and re-routed.
I went to the bus stop to catch a #47. A #37 came by, and it was supposed to be there 10 minutes earlier, but I decided to grab that bus thinking, "If it's running late who knows when the 47 will be here." I talked to the driver and it turns out he wasn't 10 minutes late. He was 40 minutes late.
Anyway, I got to George Street to my eye doctor appointment with time to spare. They had a bunch of problems scanning my eyes because I apparently have huge pupils. After the eye doctor, I went to Starbucks to meet up with my husband. I had a really big iced mocha. It was the first time I've been to Starbucks since moving here. I hate to admit it, but it totally felt like home.
After coffee, we went to Pizza Hut and had a medium Pepperoni and green chili pizza. The bathrooms were all weird. I can't even describe it. There was a labyrinth of stairs with no right angles and it was very disorienting.
After that, we got a bus over the the Pleasance theater complex. It's apparently related to the University, and it's a cool area. There's a big courtyard with a temporary bar and information booths. We found our first venue: the Pleasance Cellar. We were scheduled to see Owen Powell's The Two Closest Starbucks in Britain. The cellar was literally a cellar. Water was dripping from the ceiling and the seating was a bunch of Ikea stools. I think there was maybe room for 30 people in there. It was incredibly uncomfortable, but the good news is that Owen Powell was very funny. He had spent a year travelling Britain and measuring distances between Starbucks. He didn't hate Starbucks. Didn't love them. In fact, he admitted that he doesn't even like coffee. But he needed to know how close together 2 starbucks could be. It was genuinely funny, and he deserved a better venue.
After that, we had a short break and then went to the Pleasance One theater to see Lucy Porter's Love-In. My first impression after sitting on an Ikea stool for an hour was, "It's so comfortable!" The seating was big cushioned benches, and we got a row with extra leg room for my 6'5" husband. There was even air conditioning. But that was only secondary to the fact that Lucy Porter was hilarious. She was talking completely on the theme of love. And how she considers love to be a mental illness, but doesn't mind so much because crazy isn't so bad. She talked about bad dates and embarrassing moments and crazy habits, and she gave out prizes and had audience participation and it was completely 7 pounds well spent. I would see her again in a heartbeat.
Our final show of the night was back on George Street, and by that time Princes Street was re-opened and the buses were a little more normal. Our final show of the night was Rich Hall. The theater was a more traditional theater with the individual seats with armrests. For my husband and I, it was not really very comfortable. But Rich Hall was undeniably funny. It was his first night at the Festival, and you could tell he hadn't worked out all the kinks. It didn't help that the audience was full of drunken obnoxious British people. Despite that, he did make me laugh out loud plenty.
My husband liked Rich Hall best. I liked Lucy Porter best. We both liked Owen Powell, in spite of the venue. Overall, we had a good night and by the time we caught a midnight bus home, we were completely exhausted.
When I got home I went to bed, and laid there awake for 2 hours. I was exhausted, but my feet hurt so much they kept me awake. It was very annoying. But I've got a whole weekend to recover.
Alana
