63 posts from 2008

My own personal look back at this year’s Edinburgh Fringe is wonderfully optimistic. Despite all the gloomy news about the slump in ticket sales, I had my best year ever.

Some reviews of my show were less than favourable, yet I sold 60% more tickets this year than any other. Which makes me wonder if the reviews do sell the shows?

When I got a host of four and five star reviews back in 2006 and 2007 I was playing to fifteen people a night. This year my lowest audience was 90 punters.

So what does make the show a success? Is it the word on the street? Early press and features? Is it the gritty hard working Flyering team or just a plain determination to keep going and giving your audience a show they like? I am not totally sure.

A few things were rather disconcerting for me this year. One being the sheer amount of papering the rooms with free tickets and two-for-ones right up until the last day, this kind of marketing devalues the shows that depend on money coming through the door.

Luckily many punters who come to the Fringe have come to realise that the ‘Free shows’ are already catered for on Peter Buckley Hill’s and Alex Petty Free shows already. I fully support both of their ideals and understand that they are a great way for fresh comics testing the Fringe waters and I hope they grow throughout the years. What I find upsetting is the ‘Big Four Venues’ giving away free tickets when I am in the same venue as a show that will gladly throw the tickets to anyone who will grab them.

I believe punters will feel aggrieved at having to pay £11 for a ticket when they have gotten used to hanging around some shows that will simply give them tickets at the door to get the bums on seats. I can understand that papering rooms is acceptable for the first few days and previews. I myself did two-for –ones on the first three days. After that, it’s cash only.

I have never papered rooms at the Fringe, not even when I first did my one woman show in 2002. I would rather play to six committed punters than 40 people who really didn’t want to be there. Though that it my own personal view.

My biggest gripe with this year’s Fringe Festival was the oddly awarded If.Com Award for Panel Prize. It is usually awarded to people or a show that are deemed the ‘spirit of the Fringe’ and this year the money and title went to ALL comedians who performed in Edinburgh. Apparently there was a free bar on the 25^th of August. I didn’t bother to turn up, as I don’t really drink and didn’t agree with their choice.

I believe the Spirit of The Fringe should have gone to Peter Buckley Hill. A man who has been coming to the Fringe for at least a hundred years, supporting comedy, initiating the Free shows, showcasing comics and just being a jolly old stalwart that personifies the bonhomie of The Royal Mile.

I can’t even begin to believe that the If.Com panel found it hard to pick one person for that award, despite their protests I believe something seriously went wrong or some sort of controversy went down at that final meeting. How hard would it be to pick someone? Isn’t that their job?

At least all the comics on the Fringe can now have the If.Com logo on their posters next year; after all we did all win the prize collectively.

Well done to all who braved the rain, the ticket system fiasco and the seemingly low attendance numbers just to perform at the biggest arts festival in the world. I hope it was worth it.

It really is the middle of the night here in Edinburgh. I am staring out of the big ceiling to floor windows into the dark night sky and all I can hear are gulls screeching their odd hollow laughter at me. It’s like the echo of the stage.

So that’s another Edinburgh Fringe Festival over and done with. My 7^th year of solo shows to be exact and I sit here quietly. The whole house is asleep. Husband is happily snoring and daughter Ashley is exhausted and lying half in, half out of her flowery duvet in her bedroom, I peeped in to check she was ok. I do that every night of her life when we are in the same house. Ashley worked really hard this year organising the Flyering team and making sure the public got my face on card in their hands despite the rotten weather.

The show this year has been my most successful to date. We sold 60% more tickets this year than last. The fringe had been fraught with problems from day one as the box office failed to work! (The only we needed them to do was sell tickets and they bloody couldn’t) The weather was horrendous and people were thin on the ground due to the credit crunch and other shitty things that stall the economy. Yet I am pleased as punch.

I won an award this year (Nivea Funny Women) and I got some great reviews.

I also managed to reach a core target audience of people who had NEVER been to see comedy before, (they told me so) yet they got on trains, buses and cars to come see my show. That is an awesome feeling.

But this strange feeling of pulling everything down and moving the family yet again to another city does become weary. I realise that we are just travelling show people, cases packed, publicity material stored and the show moves on yet again.

I don’t think I will ever settle in one place for the rest of my life. You get hooked on moving around, doing comedy in a different town, different continent or country year in and year out. Husband is getting fed up with it I think. He lay in bed tonight and asked me when we pack up again to go off after we go back to Glasgow and when I told him it was next week, he sighed. He never spoke, he turned around in bed, moved my arm off his chest and humped into a ball and fell asleep. I fear he is bored with it all and who could blame him?

Ashley will settle back in Glasgow as she has Uni to get back to and her own life. She has been coming to Edinburgh Fringe with me since she was 10 years old, back when I first started doing three or two hander shows in the mid 90s. She even did stand up comedy herself in her One –Girl show when she was 13 years old. It’s in the blood.

I had such a great time this year; it was very laid back and lazy at times. I didn’t take on as much work this time and was only doing one show a day, other than the few nights I was a guest on someone else’s bill of course.

Husband and I got to spend loads of time together as we didn’t have many guests stay over at the Edinburgh Flat as we had done in the past. It was just the three of us for most of the time. Though he did go back to Glasgow for a few days respite from the Festival madness, he did enjoy the peace and quiet!

I am off to Glasgow today and will miss Edinburgh. Roll on next year!

Ashley is on the streets every day handing out the flyers, and she has a great wee team with her who manage to get my name out there. The problem is the bloody box office system, first they tell people that there are NO tickets left for me, then deny they said that, and then offer other shows to people who want to buy my tickets, and then deny that as well. But luckily Ashley went in to the Fringe Box office and pretended to be a punter and asked for tickets to my show. She was told I was sold out and did she want to buy tickets for some other bloke’s comedy show. Ashley exploded and explained she had full control and access to the ticket sales and she knew personally that there were tickets available for my show.

I had to make seven phone calls to finally release twenty tickets for my show, which was after hours of the Fringe Box office saying I was sold out when I wasn’t! No wonder I am stressed to hell.

The Pleasance has been helpful and is trying to resolve the Fringe Ticket Fiasco.

So if you come through to Edinburgh and try to buy tickets for my show and they tell you it is sold out, COME TO THE PLESANCE DOME TICKET BOX OFFICE and buy them there. I am usually at the Pleasance Dome Box Office around 6.40pm. If you had problems getting a ticket, tell me personally! I will deal with it myself and try my best to make sure you get in.

I will NOT let the incompetence of the systems that they programmed ensure my punters and I lose out.

Thanks everyone for coming to see me and if you see my daughter Ashley handing out flyers in Edinburgh, give her a big smile for me, encouragement is a wonderful thing!

My show is at Pleasance Dome at 7pm every night and it’s going great. I have had a wonderful 4 star review and the other reviews haven’t been printed yet.

The rain in Edinburgh really flooded the city over the past week and that has affected sales big time. The good news is, I got to meet the amazing Joan Rivers, I got to have sell out shows and I got to see my best mate Monica, her sister and her mum. They all came through to see the show.

I have been video taping some stuff for a video blog and Ashley and husband are exhausted with the organising and Flyering side of things. Poor Ashley looked like a seal as she stood in the rain for hours handing out the leaflets promoting my show. I feel so sorry for her and the other guys that are helping me; I hope the evil rain goes away soon.

Good news is, people have stopped bringing kids to my comedy show. It was becoming mental, I mean, I am chatty but for adults only to be honest. The show isn’t that rude, but there is adult content in there.

So today is Saturday and I have period pains that would kill a horse, the cluster bomb in my womb is going big guns, yet I have to smile and pretend I am not bleeding to death. (When does this stop?).

I am having a great time at the Fringe; I do love everything about it and can’t stop smiling every time I see my face on a poster, or a stranger buying a ticket for my show. These things keep me going!

It was the summer of 1980 when we decided to get married, we settled on a date in late September. We had already been living together, I had turned 19 and husband was still 17 when we got the plans together. God, we were so bloody young, what were we thinking? I wasn’t pregnant and we didn’t have to do it, but I thought I loved him enough and basically we wanted to escape our families and make a wee life for us.

I recall cycling on my wee red bike into Glasgow city centre to a wedding dress shop. The first dress I spotted was £58 it was on the sale and it fitted fine, so I bought it within six minutes of being in the place. I didn’t really see wedding dresses as a big thing, to me it was like a work uniform or some sort of attire that was required for the day. I didn’t once consider style, shape or size; I was pleased I got one cheap. I knew husband would be pleased at my penny pinching methods. He didn’t really approve of spending what you didn’t have, and I too didn’t want to go into debt over a bloody dress.

The woman who served me said “You should look at others, you shouldn’t just pick one this quick, and your mum should see it first as well”

She was being really pushy and kept nagging at me to consider other dresses and I wanted the one I spotted myself. It was cheap, it was white and it fitted, what more did I need? I was only a teenager with no real fashionable insight and I was worried about my bike that was sitting downstairs in the shop front.

I was annoyed at this and said “My mother is dead” and I handed her the cash. The woman looked shamed and shut up.

Now my mum wasn’t dead, but I just wanted to buy it and get out of there, I know it was a rash thing to say, but she was pushing me emotionally and I wanted to shock her into shutting up. My opinion was important and didn’t need my mum to yea or nay the frock, nor did I need that scraggy faced woman’s opinion- it was my wedding day and my dress.

You should have seen the look of horror on the woman’s face when I tied the big white cardboard box that contained the puffy white dress onto the back of my bike with a big stretchy wire. It was funny looking back, she must have thought I was nuts.

Husband and I decided to get married from our family home’s instead of our own flat in the Calton.

So he was staying at his dad’s and I was at my mum’s flat in Shettleston.

I kept the dress at a friends house near my mums as her house wasn’t really that clean and I was worried it would get smoke damaged from all her smoking or dirty there.

The night before I got married, I cycled over to my father in laws house, my husband to be was out working at the bar and I knew my father in law would be alone. I brought the bike into the hallway and he and I sat and watched TV. I needed a bath and my mum’s bath hadn’t worked since 1976 and I didn’t want to be a stinky bride.

After my bath, my father in law and I sat and ate ice-cream and cycled back home where I met up with Maggie. She was my bridesmaid and an old pal of mine. We both stayed at my mum’s that night. Our wedding was at 11am the next morning and we had hairdresser’s appointments the next morning. We both got our hair done and simply walked back to my mum’s flat.

It was a hive of activity; my brothers and my niece Debbie were there, all getting ready for my early wedding! People were chatting, drinking beer, all getting excited and kept asking me if was ok. Maggie and I felt odd being the centre of attention but carried on with our business of getting dressed up for the big day.

I didn’t have make up or anything else to do, as I didn’t wear make up back then. There were no big preparations. So I simply got out of my jeans and jumper and pulled on the dress, I thought I looked nice. I popped the diamante tiara on my head, pulled over the veil and that was me done and dusted!

No fuss, no messing or flapping about nervously. I recall walking out of my childhood bedroom dressed up in the big white dress and felt like I was going to out for my Halloween party, I spotted my wee red bike and I wished I could just jump on it and cycle away.

The morning passed quickly, the wedding ceremony was over in a flash. We went to his dad’s pub, that’s where we first met. We ate lunch and by 1pm we were out of there, I got into my jeans and we left the two dysfunctional mis-matched families to their own devices and went to a bed and breakfast in Saltcoats for our honeymoon.

Husband and I got there early and decided to go see a movie as we had time to kill. We saw ‘Kramer versus Kramer’ a film about divorce on our wedding night! We ate chips and headed to the accommodation. It was slightly smelly and really old fashioned.

It was freezing cold and the bed was foamy and hard. A cat meowed loudly at our window all night long and in the morning a big Alsatian dog that belonged to the owners bit me as I went for breakfast. Memorable.

So there we have it. A wedding, a cheap dress, a non existent hen party, a horrible honeymoon and nearly 30 years of marriage, not bad eh?

Ashley finally feels better and I somehow start vomiting instead. Now this is too busy a day for me to be throwing up, I have to do a photo session then get on an aeroplane to Cardiff, so I get stressed more and puke up more.

Husband holds my hair back as throw up more bile into the loo. The make up I had carefully applied for the photo’s was now either being sweated or smeared down my face. That’s when the photographer called me from his car to let me know he was downstairs waiting. We had time issues; I had to get the pics done before 11am so that I could get to the airport in time for the flight. Subsequently I had no time to make myself look presentable.

I managed to pat some foundation powder on my scaly white face and run downstairs. We drove to Shettleston, I felt cold, sick and creeped out by old streets. I saw where my mammy lived, where I went to school and the photographer decided to get me out onto the street for the picture.

“Can you twirl round that lamppost?” he shouted, behind the huge lens of his camera.

“No, I will vomit again; can we do pictures that don’t involve me swinging, twirling or doing anything that will induce sickness?” I groaned.

I vomited again. The man waited for me to wipe my mouth, I smiled and he clicked on his camera.

I finally got home in time to see Ashley looking better from her puking session (what the hell is wrong with us?) and caught the flight to Cardiff.

The hotel is nice and I checked in with time to get ready for my comedy show at Jongleurs. I stood at the window and stared out. At that precise moment a big white beady eyed gull landed right on my window sill, pecked the window and stared at me.

I flinched. It stared. I poked at the window, it nodded its head. I clapped my hands hoping it would hear me through the glass, it stared more and refused to budge.

“There is a big scary gull staring at me and wont get off my window ledge” I hissed to husband on the phone. I don’t know why I was whisperings, the gull just stared at me, occasionally cocking its head at me and pushing one back beady eye further up to the glass.

“Maybe it’s your mum coming back to see you from the dead, you had a worrying day and this is her way of comforting you” he said.

“My dead mammy is a fucking seagull in Cardiff?” I screeched at him “Couldn’t she come back as an eternal butterfly or something beautiful and romantic? Not a big beady eyed gull”

“Well people don’t choose what they come back as” he added. Now he was annoying me. I had banged a shoe at the window to get rid of the gull and that means I have tired to attack my long dead mum who happens to have become a seagull, my day was already tough enough.

The gull stared at me.

“Are you my dead mammy” I shouted through the window. The gull stared and bobbed its head. “It’s saying YES” I shouted to husband.

“See, I told you it was your mum” he laughed.

The gull flew off the ledge and I laughed as well. Just like my mum, it got bored with me talking.

So The Sunday Herald will carry an article and a photo of me tomorrow, good news all round. Am off to stalk the streets of Cardiff to see if I can spot my mammy flying over the rooftops and throw her some bread, she may be hungry.

The downside is this- Each Monday after the column is printed I have the shocking fear and slow drip-drip of anxiety that I have to do it all again for next week.

What the hell will I write about? Does anyone really want to know about my lack of organising skills? Shall I talk about Ashley’s lack of love life? Will she hate me? Do the readers despise me and rip up my column so they can wipe their ass on it? Do other journalists hate me and mock my words?

You see I am a stand up comic to trade (if that is an actual trade?) and I work live in front of people who show their immediate distaste or appraisal in the moment in front me….waiting to be judged over the week makes me feel itchy under my skin.

I do get comments from people on the Scotsman website and they veer from ‘We hate this woman’ to ‘Janey is right about this topic’ and once my column was even quoted on the US Fox News website, so it’s not all good or bad.

I just worry, I suppose. The other downside is that my blog has been suffering slightly as I don’t always get to write my most inner thoughts as I have been either busy on the column of have diverted the subject to the newspaper and it didn’t quite make it to the blog.

So there we have it. Today was even busier as I freelance write for other publications and had to write 800 words to deadline and finish my Scotsman column and write this blog and finish off admin for the fringe.

I am comedian, when did life get so bloody busy? I haven’t brushed my teeth and it’s nearly 2pm. I am off to Cardiff tomorrow to do comedy, so its back on the old flight-taxi-hotel trip again. Another anonymous city, with yet another strange bed and nightmares in another dark room, yet I do love my job.

Like the old hooker once said “It’s not the job that kills me, it’s the stairs”

How right she was.

I recall watching an anorexic French girl with a geometrical blunt haircut throw broken plates at an empty box as she recited the bible. She was a mix between my mammy in an alcoholic induced rant and Joan of Arc in her ‘black period’. People cheered when she fled the room threatening to kill herself in broken English. I was seriously worried about her well being, I never mistook her emotional breakdown for art. Other people did. I saw her in the car park cutting herself with her broken pottery and I didn’t know if I should intervene or give the display an appraisal. I wrestled her to the ground to get the sharp object out of her hand. Turns out that was part of the show and people who had also followed her out shouted at me to stop ruining the finale.

The second act that day was watching what I can only describe as a homeless man eat sticky buns as he stood silently in his dirty coat that occasionally flashed open to reveal a very impressive erection. He was cheered on endlessly; people were very amazed at his avant garde display. I managed a smile and I was quite taken by his show, who can eat that many buns and maintain sexual tension? That turned out to be an actual homeless man who simply walked in and ate the buffet. I was then angry, because I enjoyed the show and I was duped and now there were no buns at the break.

Last week at a private comedy event I watched a young, very posh middle class guy attempt stand up comedy. His friends at the side of the room had assured him he was very funny and he should get up at this event and do the show. It was a horrible slow car crash of a comedy death, my kidneys hurt for him, and I watched all his young mates applaud him as he spoke clunky clumsy words that baffled everyone. No one in the main audience laughed; in fact they stared in silence as he carried on talking about Badgers and jam at length. “Is it just me or does everyone imagine that badgers are addicted to cheese?”

“Yes, it is JUST YOU” I wanted to scream. No one thinks that and by the way mate, that isn’t even funny.

He carried on ranting and came off to the sound of his own feet.

It was all very bizarre and smacked of too many nights watching The Mighty Boosh (a successful surreal comedy duo). When he reached the side of the stage, I rushed to offer him reassurance and kind words, but he ran like a king to his friends who all hand slapped and high-fived him. The audience were stunned and took some cajoling back into a decent funny vibe. He was crap at comedy, but in his mind he was amazing. The lack of laughter did nothing to convince him otherwise. He would go off later to the local bar with his wee middle class mates and regale them with stories about his successful comedy debut.

What I am saying is that I am not sure if I can now tell the difference between art and complete baloney….and is there one?

Comedy is defined by being funny. It is something that makes people laugh. I know this because I am a comedian.

I will never understand conceptual art, experimental theatre or even Picasso in his strange plate painting period. Squinty faces splattered on red odd shaped plates made me think of special people who get to do ceramic painting with their mouth as their limbs were missing.

I may be a total philistine but at least I know shit when I see it.

I was sexually abused as a child and somehow discovered hair pulling as a way to divert the pain by ripping out my hair. I did eventually explain to my mum about the abuse, though somehow she chose to ignore my words and therefore allowed her brother to continue to sexually abuse me. My hair pulling got worse. I don’t know when I stopped doing it.

To this day I still tug at my hair, I twist it and sometimes chew the ends and on occasion I do pull wee bits out. The strange pain it evokes makes me feel odd and I know that it is wrong and damaging to my scalp, but somewhere deep inside it reminds me of my childhood pain, yet I continue.

Everyone thinks I am terribly strong and brave because I survived the abuse, because I do comedy about my past and because I wrote a book about my difficult life, but underneath it all I am still a child who tugs her hair out sometimes.

I know I will never reach the point where I actually rip chunks out, but I do still fiddle with my hair too much. I need to address this and stop it.

My daughter Ashley took a photo of me from the side on, in that picture I was chewing my hair; I looked at it and felt terrible shame and horror at what I do.

So today I am resolved to stopping it all, maybe by admitting it I am addressing it will help me do this.

I am a sucker for a fairytale.

Whereas my smatterings of wee drunk smelly men were invariably unimpressed “Turn that shite off” Archie the old safe blower shouted. He had one of those old wrinkled faces that seemed to be permanently chewing something. His skin was the colour of a tea stained chamois leather cloth, the malleable softness of his saggy face morphed into a host of shapes as his gums rotated constantly.

Yet his startlingly blue eyes sparkled with fun when he chatted to you. Every story started out a dull pedestrian anecdote about one night when he had just finished work on the boats and somehow ended up with him having hard core sex- the man was deeply odd, filthy and funny. According to him, he had shagged more people than Frank Sinatra; he reckoned it was the blue eyes that did it. I avoided him at all costs.

I stood at the other end of the bar where Tony the dancing alcoholic was throwing himself about, Gene Kelly style, he was about 80 years old and I often worried he would drop down dead.

The day wore on the customers came and went.

The wedding on the telly was reaching its big crescendo – Lady Diana was at St. Pauls Cathedral. I squinted through the streaming sunlight that shafted through the open door and tried to see the much talked about wedding dress.

At that moment Bella came in.

She was wearing a bright red Spanish off-the-shoulder dress; it was layered with black taffeta and swung like a wonky lampshade as she moved. She donned a pair of white plastic sling-back shoes and a really inappropriately placed fake rose stuck between her low slung floppy breasts. I stifled a sigh.

“Hello boys, Bella is here, who wants a dance?” she clattered and skittered over the dirty lino towards Tony.

Her hair was dyed the same shade of jet black that people usually reserve for painting taxi cabs and it was piled randomly on top of her head. A silver shell-like hair comb was stabbed into the crown of the loose bun.

Bella was about 70 years old.

“Janey, I will have a wee or big-wee glass of beer, but just charge me for the wee bit of it” Bella purred. This was her usual request.

The first time I had met her I was totally confused between the ‘Big-Wee’ glass sizes, but I soon worked it out. You gave her a half pint of beer as that’s all she could afford.

I loved Bella; she made me smile and her bizarre collection of outfits really brightened the place up. I recalled how she dressed up as a Hawaiian dancer, straw skirt and garland of flowers over a pink stretchy bikini top, scary and funny especially as it was December and the snow was knee-deep that day.

I slipped her a shot of whisky “To celebrate the Royal Wedding, its free” I smiled.

Bella downed the whisky, slammed the glass down, and then whispered “Fuck the Queen, but thanks for the drink” Her scarlet lips parted and she stuck out her tongue through tainted misshapen teeth that were the colour of fresh butter.

I laughed out loud. Bella click-clacked on her cheap heels and dropped a coin into the jukebox. Minutes later Dean Martin started crooning out through the speakers. Prince Charles was staring solemnly at his bride and Lady Diana was being coy through a bridal veil. Dean belted out ‘That’s Amore!’

Tony the dancer clutched Bella by the waist and they were off. His shaking veined hands gripped her tightly.

Archie ignored them and chewed his face off in silence. He dismissed the dancers with a wave of one hand over his shoulder and stared into the distance.

Within minutes Bella managed to get away from Tony, he was good for about a minute of dancing then it usually and quickly descended into a groping sexual assault. Bella knew the routine, prised herself out of Tony’s hands and threw herself into the bar seat. All flushed, her hair falling down out of the multitude of hair grips that failed to keep it in place.

Tony carried on dancing without her; he shuffled about and sang loudly. The men in my bar may have been really old, but they were constantly on the heat!

Bella went into her usual routine of asking me probing questions and quickly providing the answers herself. “Are you happy Janey?” then before I could speak she said “Course your not fucking happy, you are still here in this shit hole of a bar. Do you regret getting married so young? Yes, I bet you do of course you do, men are all fucked and use you up till you don’t know your arse from your elbow” Then she leaned over and gripped my hand “Run away Janey, while you are young- go darling just fucking run away and don’t look back, did I tell you my man was an evil bastard and ran away when I was pregnant?”

“Your man was a violent bastard, you were well rid of him Bella, he broke your two legs with a cricket bat” Archie hissed between chews, then he added “Who plays cricket in Glasgow? He must have been a poof as well”

“I loved him” Bella screamed, she pointed a blood red fingernail at her crepe skinned chest “he was MY LIFE” she ran towards Archie and spat her words at his face “He never hurt me in his life, he was a gentleman”

Archie raised his wiry eyebrows at me, mouthed and mimed with a shaky fist “he punched the baby out of her”

Bella screamed again and pulled at Archie’s old shirt. He let her inflict the pain on him. Archie had been through this drama before with Bella.

Then she burst into tears. This was what always happened with Bella. Dancing, laughing and then the floods of tears over the bastard husband, I felt so sad for her.

Meanwhile back in St. Pauls Cathedral Prince Charles never cracked a smile.

He spoke his vows with pure conviction as Bella, Archie, Tony and I sat in silence. We watched as the blonde Diana whispered her vows, she looked flustered.

Then suddenly the peace was broken as Bella screamed “Fuck men, all of them” and threw a half pint glass at the wee television that was hung from the ceiling in the corner of the bar.

I screamed in fright. I didn’t expect Bella to throw the glass, the noise was deafening as it smashed to pieces on the tiled floor beneath the telly. The TV flickered but continued to screen the Royal couple though the volume was now gone.

Archie shouted “Fucksake Bella, calm down hen” then went back to chewing his gums.

Tony carried on dancing to a long gone tune that was playing in his head.

I rushed round the bar with a brush and pan and tried to clear up the mess.

Bella continued to scream and cry. She was pulling out all her hair grips, she was ripping at her dress, and she was going absolutely mental.

“Janey, can I get a pint of lager hen?” Archie shouted over the din.

I ignored Archie and tried to console Bella. “Come on Bella, don’t get yourself so upset” I hugged her and stroked her warm shoulder. She sniffed on a tissue I gave her; she looked at me with dark heavily made-up eyes and spoke in a hushed voice “Can I have a wee-big beer?” I nodded and went round the bar to pour her beer.

Bella eventually settled down, climbed on a stool and supped on her drink, Archie lit a roll up cigarette and Tony finally fell asleep on the couch near the door.

We all watched the Royal Wedding on the telly which was now without sound, the rich and famous mouthing words, heaving crowds waving Union flags, and opera singer Kiri Te Kiwana belting out a silent song during the wedding service. I laughed as Bella opening her scarlet lips to imitate the singer’s mouth but uttering no noise, Archie chewed and Tony snored.

My husband came in and stared at the scene, pointed at the television “Why are you watching it with the volume down?”

“It’s not down, it’s broke. I smashed a glass at the telly coz all men are bastards and I hate weddings and I think I have fucked the volume” Bella said loudly to my young husband, she shrugged and went straight back to her beer.

Husband replied “Ok, I am going upstairs, I will see you later”

Bella, Archie and I looked back at the telly and tried to guess what was happening without the commentary as the camera panned the cathedral and its royal guests.

Bella was found dead in a hostel a week later. Apparently she dressed up as sailor-girl, and was found clutching a photo of her bastard husband after taking a fatal dose of pain killers.

Archie and I cried when we spoke about her. Tony danced.