Edinburgh Festival review

Just came back from a weekend at the Fringe. Had a very good time and saw some excellent shows. Friday, at The BBC Comedy Presents, I saw "The Boy with tape on his face", a bloke with electrical tape over his mouth, a manbag full of props, amazing eye ball eloquence, and a willing audience. I laughed non-stop, and so did the audience, so I can't even say I was the only mad one. He uses music from films we can all recognise to make this show innovative, contemporary and utterly brilliant. If you can see this, I highly recommend it.

On Saturday I went to the Jazz Bar, four quid for five comedy shows, a band, a movie and crisps. Yes, crisps, it went down spiffingly well with all those beers. Anyway, one of the stand ups was Shazia Mirza, taking the piss of her Pakistani culture, arranged marriages and sex. I have seen her on tv before, but live and non-recorded she is the rudest and best female comedian in Britain, in my humble opinion.

Now, trying to eat at the Festival without having booked a table three years in advance is quite a challenge. My friends and I went to about fifteen restaurants and they were all fully booked until 9pm. We queued for twenty minutes at 'Monster Mash', in the rain, without as little as eye contact from the staff; they simply ignored us until we shouted for attention. Then a little Prick came over full of attitude asking "what is it!" , we said we would like a table and pointed to an empty one; the Prick said they were fully booked and had no tables for us. Well, it wouldn't have hurt to tell us that 20min ago, would it, Prick!! A mash house with bad attitude! I hope someone sends them a bag full of cat shit in the post! I didn't even wanna eat there, but couldn't even find a MacDonalds (not wanted that either, but hunger was strong). Nevertheless, all worked out ok, as we ended up at Iman's and I had the best curry ever. Still hate Monster Mash, though, might start saving up cat litter...

iPhone 4 White: where are you?

As much as I love Apple, you got hate them sometimes. There I was, all excited about getting a new iPhone, contract finishing soon, all set to have the iPhone4 for September, counting the days...then there comes the iPhone4 White! So clean, so beautiful, so shiny, so like my Wii, modern, the colour of the future, Apple white... I 'already know how to use it'. Must have this product!
But in its rush to create new, Apple forget some basic, basic stuff, like, to test stuff before they announce it! I can see a huge danger of Apple becoming like Microsoft, sell sell sell any crap just because it's new and we suckers will buy it anyway. Antenna problem? No problem! Who needs to make phone calls these days anyway? I only talk to my friends on Facebook. Proximity detection problem? No bother! I was going to buy a cover anyway, my iPhone needs to last 18 months before I can upgrade to an i5, so I need to protect it, don't I? Yes, we will buy it anyway, so there is no need to torture us with promises of iUnicorn4 which you can't deliver, Apple! It wasn't very clever, because if you kept quiet I would have bought a black iPhone4, but now I must wait for the white. It is just not fair. Meanwhile, what to do? Well, maybe I should check out some new crap from Microsoft to buy. Naaaaah, just save for an IPad instead. Does it come in white??? No, don't tell me!

London's war zone: Oxford Street

I don't know about you, but for me a trip to Oxford Street at the weekend would be similar to shopping in Kabul post UK/USA invasion: psychologically damaging. It was not my choice to go there today, no, I was set up. My type of shopping in Oxford St involves taking a Monday off work and arriving at 9am; or a late Friday evening, when everyone else is clubbing or out or whatever people do, and Topshop/Zara/Mango are virtually flapper free. Other than those particular times, I lose my rag. I mean, how can people stop in the most stupid places, block entrances and stairwells, stop in the middle of incoming traffic and be generally like retarded sheep?? It is not logic! God help us if they drive like that! I must have a permanent 'what the fuck' face, and I try to give them the evil look and tut and shake my head in disapproval, but still they behave as if they don't know what a pavement is for. It is really very simple: please walked in a straight line, hurry up a bit as there are a million people behind you trying to walk past, do not stop at the bottom/top of the escalators!, do not block the entire pavement with your friends/family and do not for goodness sake try to use your credit card in the Oyster slot!!! Seriously!! I have seen that!! Every time I get home from Oxford Street I think I need to check my blood pressure, surely my blood is going to boil inside me and I will end up spontaneously combusting! I think I suffer from Oxford Street rage...