MY VERSION OF BRIEF ENCOUNTER

Watched 'Brief Encounter', that old Lovely Black and white film by David Lean and written by Noel Coward.

Starring Celia Johnston and Trevor Howard.

It really is a fantastic film and so well shot.

Although I cannot stop laughing at the whole thing, poor Celia plays a well kept middle class woman who lives in Bromley (Somewhere like that), her husband is a banker who wears a full three-piece suit at home (including waistcoat) and looks around 67 although he is probably only 26! 

He likes to stand near the open fire dressed in an axminster suit sweating buckets and puffing on a pipe.

They have two kids, a boy and a girl, both have cut glass English accents that I swear to God -Prince Charles would have struggled to maintain, I have never heard such upper class pronunciation!!

Celia also has a cook and house keeper. It seems her only duty is to go shopping for some vegetables and wander round Boots in a tight constricted wool coat with big buttons. 

Sweating lots is a feature in this family.

Can she do this locally? 
NO fucking chance she has to get a train into the nearest town.

In the station there is a proper tea room with a slovenly older woman who flirts with that bloke who played the working class dad in My Fair Lady...him that sang "I'm getting married in the morning" there is a coal fire (there is an open fire in almost every scene).

 The very common people in the train tea room are the only believable characters in the film.

This woman takes a train and picks up some shopping, a few books from 'Boots'?? Then she goes to the 'pictures'. 

The 'pictures' being the movies...this lazy bastard picks carrots, books and a movie...then stares at some local statues round town, then wanders home to eat the cook’s dinner.

Anyway one day it all goes very different.

She meets a doctor by chance at the well frequented train station and gets his attention as she gets a 'bit of dust in her eye'. 

He pokes the corner of a hankie into her eyeball....all being a metaphor for his cock and they are suddenly .....staring at each other.

Before long they are meeting up every week as she goes shopping and then off to the 'pictures' with her new friend.

I have never seen so many smokers in my life as in that picture house, (Jesus the smoke is so thick I am surprised that people can see the screen). It was like a smoking competition.

They start to get excited about meeting up despite both of them being married; Trevor explains that his wife is very small, dark and very frail. 

Which suggests he cannot have sex with her in case she breaks, but he never explains her illness, which is weird as he is a doctor. He could have told us the secretive bastard.

This is in the social era when if a woman 'looked' at another man in any sexual way she gets sent to a mental health sanctuary to get 'electric shock treatment ' Yet despite the social taboos they continue to keep each other company.

They meet up and they go into the country for a walk, have a wee boat ride, in which he falls into the water-then they both go to the boatyard to dry off and of course MAKE TEA (as if to go a whole day without tea would have been insufferable). 

She dries his sodden smelly socks over the hot stove (yet another coal fire) in the boat house as the poor boat house attendant sits in a bad mood as posh people have hogged his heat. 

They fall in love over the steam of wet woollen socks.

He tells her that their affair has driven him to leave England and live abroad as they can never be together. 

He suggests going to his friend's apartment for some quiet time and a last goodbye-(yeah right mate!) and leaves her to think about it when she refuses to come along. Celia strolls around the station debating whether or not to go with Trevor; it was a big dilemma for her.

Her head was saying “Go home bake cakes"

But her pussy was shouting “Eat Me!!”

Eventually she ends up in the flat (which was very swish and YUPPIE-ish for mid- 1940's) and sitting there with her doctor friend, the sexual tension was palpable...Just when you think they may actually touch knees- they are interrupted by the doc's mate (Who incidentally is the gayest man I have EVER seen in my life).

Celia flees the apartment by the back door in a running hysteria (how awful when one has to leave by the service entrance) and goes running through the streets hysterical, dishevelled and ends up sitting in the park smoking and crying pulling Kirby grips from her hair (this appears to be such unruly behaviour in Bromley that even a policeman stops to comment and check on her!)

She eventually phones her husband at home and lies easily about being out so late without an escort, (She should have fucked her doctor, she was a competent liar and could have carried it off).

She then walks to the railway station soaking wet and sad and meets Trevor in the tea room (he had been looking for her all over the statues and benches of Bromley frantically) and now is saying his final goodbye as he is going to emigrate to South Africa (Hopefully not to buy a farm coz that will surely end in tears, posh English farmers don’t fit in well, especially with a weak sick wife).

They are interrupted by a 'beastly but kindly? Woman friend (who talked too much-that would be my role in that movie!) 

Therefore, they don’t get to say goodbye properly! (they drink four cups of tea; I am convinced it's all the fucking caffeine that's making them so highly strung).

Trevor simply squeezes her shoulder as he leaves the tea room to catch his train home to his frail skinny wife with a nameless wasting disease.

Celia gets so upset she dashes onto the platform. The express train comes hurtling through and she contemplates suicide! 

But she can't do it as she is too posh and English also she knows there are dishes to arrange for summer picnics and socks to mend by a roaring fire.

(seriously lady -go home and touch yourself woman, get a grip)

Finally she goes home to her husband who is still wearing a three piece Wooster thick tweed suit sitting trying to do a crossword in a house with a roaring coal fire...(fuck he must be sweating & dying to strip off and sit in his vest like a Northern unemployed man that he has read about in the newspaper).

Celia sits and darns socks as she looks kindly at her fat woolly husband and thinks to herself...."I am just an ordinary housewife in an ordinary house...how did this happen to me?".

I will tell you why, you fancied another man, the thought of sleeping in twin satin covered beds with a man who is clad in wool and smokes a pipe who cannot fucking finish a cross word without interrupting your private thoughts was KILLING you. 

You wanted a blonde skinny dashing doctor who loves the movies, smokes fags and seems to work a three day week for the NHS and had time to hang out on boating lakes, and took you for champagne lunches, he even had a fancy Pied- a -Terre and a snappy gay friend....it's OK to admit it!

I think I will watch "To kill a Mocking bird " next and give my version of that?

I still have a daddy

There can’t be many milestones in life other than getting married, having a baby and putting your dad into an old folk’s home.

I have now done all three.

The first two were easier than the last one.

For those who follow me on facebook and twitter you will already be aware of my dad’s slow slide into dementia.

Dad has lived alone for seven years since my step mum succumbed to cancer.

I have heard him having a stroke whilst we were chatting on the phone when I was in Los Angeles and managed to get him swift care. Since then the sly sneaking horrible bastard that is dementia has been crawling around his brain looking for wee spaces to hide in and reveal itself whilst he was at his most vulnerable.

Nothing is more soul wrenching than watching your dad feel terrified that he is a factory and nobody will help him get out.

We tried being with him everyday in his own home and the social care from Glasgow NHS and Glasgow council has been utterly brilliant the NHS mental health people are fabulous. Dad’s care worker Mark even counselled me when I sat in floods of tears outside my venue at Edinburgh Fringe. Dad had a bad day and called me hysterical. Mark called me and reassured me I was doing the best I can.

Dad was escaping his house and upsetting the neighbours with his constant vulnerability. My dad has great neighbours and they have all grown up together so it was hard for them to see the wee proud private man look confused outside their door.

I got emergency respite in a care home 66 steps from my front door. I can see him 5 times a day or more if I please. He looks peaceful and feels secure and now when he gets a dementia ‘attack’ the staff and I are usually there to reassure him.

Tonight I went to see him before I went onstage. He was lying on his bed listening to his radio; he smiled when I came into his room. I slipped my shoes off dropped off my jacket and climbed up beside him and he shuffled over. He hugged me and we listened to Dr Hook and Eagles songs.  I nearly feel asleep!

 “Janey you need to get to work” he said.

He seems ok. I feel ok. I still have my daddy.

Dementia Sucks

It’s 7am the phone rings. My husband immediately sits up and answers the phone. He is quiet, I can hear my dad shouting down the line and husband says “look, am on my way calm down”.

My husband has his clothes and shoes on the floor, ready to run like a criminal on the lam. He is dressed in seconds, his hair stands on end, he doesn’t brush his teeth and he belts out the door. He is going to sit with my dad who is convinced that today he is in a factory and is being held hostage. I have to get ready for a radio comedy show. I can’t go with him; I have to be funny in a wee while.

My dad has dementia. The smart wee Glasgow man who has blue twinkly eyes, who could build a radio from scratch when he was eight years old, who raised four kids and built a skateboard for me in 1967, was slowly having his memory and cognitive abilities eaten by a rabid shitty greedy thing called dementia.

The man who carried me over puddles, who explained sea weed couldn’t eat me despite my big brothers telling me it could, the man who tried to make sense of my mum being murdered in the early 80s and his second wife dying from cancer six years ago….this wee working class man who achieved 34 years of sobriety was crumbling in front of me. My heart is breaking.

It’s been two years of a quick sand effect of watching him struggle with the world interspersed with him locking eyes with me telling me how much he loves me and how proud he is of me. I still climb halfway onto his knee and let him rest his soft warm palm on my cheek as he sings “My wee Janey Paney” to me. He is still my dad.

Today we had to organise emergency care respite as he has been wandering outside and making everyone panic. Despite alarms and constant care attending, the minute he is alone he is out that door. He will soon move to a full time care home.

My heart hurts. Go fuck yourself dementia.

Edinburgh and THE FREE FESTIVAL

I recall standing outside the Pleasance Dome flyering my show a few years ago.

I was exhausted and knew I had to fill a big room and faced losing cash so I was anxious and desperate to make sure people came to see me. 

I had rented a good flat and paid for amazing posters and had what I believed to be a fabulous show.

Then I spotted a couple of people who had seen me at a showcase show and had taken my flyer after the gig as they liked my stuff. I brightened up and as I approached them I watched a comedy promoter hand them two free tickets to his latest newly signed act's show. 

They took them. They were FREE.

He had a HUGE wad of free tickets and was giving them to people all around the Pleasance Dome. I lost the sale. I watched and my heart sank as people didn't give a fuck how funny I had been at the 1pm showcase show. 

They had free tickets.

Free shows are part of the fringe and belong in the free venues.

No doubt this year the BIG Four will release the BEST EVER SALES AT THE FRINGE and sit back as they manipulate the figures and the PR will spin it good. It was a fair year I think but it wasn't a bumper.

I know that the figures aren't always true, for ONE BIG SELL OUT there are hundreds of smaller shows underwriting them in the big venues and those comics were doing it on their own cash in the hope of a crowd.

They go home skint, owing money and artistically broken.

I have no issue wth the big paid venues, I just see issues that the Free Festival can resolve.

On the last weekend of the fringe I watched BIG NAMED ACTS give away TWO for ONES on the last Thursday and Friday. That's not a great financial sign and was I aggressively flyered for a comic whose face graces the BILLBOARDS to buy tickets for his 'EXTRA SOLD OUT SHOW' which is a weird oxymoron. It can't be sold out and still have tickets to sell. 

People were so scared of losing face.

I was glad I chose to take part in Alex Petty's Free Festival at The Counting House. I considered it last year and checked out the venues and looked at all the options.

Me and Ashley had a BUMPER run and played to full rooms every day. I had people sitting on the floor of the ballroom and Ashley had people standing in her wee room. 

They put cash in the buckets. We left with a profit, a very good profit if truth be told. We also told the crowds if they donated silver and bronze coins we gave that to the homeless and later on we dished it out fairly round the city's street collectors.

The Counting House had its own set of challenges but were daily overcome by Big Brian and the staff. Me, Ashley and my own front of house staff Andrew and Helen ushered, crowd controlled and helped other acts audiences get into shows. We self managed. We directed people, we unblocked toilets, we mopped up spilt beer, we lifted up posters and flyers, we collected glasses and we even served beer when it got busy. We were a team.

I encouraged comics and acts to get up and pitch their shows to my big comedy loving crowd. I tweeted about other comics gigs and helped flyer for other shows. It felt like THE FRINGE.

We hung out in the independent comic book shop DeadHead Comics next door to Counting House. WE periscoped and tweeted and showed them how to manage their social media.

They gave us a set of keys and we ended up weeping buckets as we exchanged gifts and hugs when we left them to head home.

We had a fringe family.

The people who came to the shows were brilliant.

Ashley loved her first hour and she was also in a big musical event show at the Assembly that ran for two weeks. So she was on the Free Festival and the Big Venue festival at the same time.

 A great experience for her. She also did some BBC radio Four Extra live work and I did Just a Minute for BBC Radio Four. It was brilliant.

Dealing with hard cash was weird. I felt like a mid price hooker, I haven't had that much money in my bag in years. We generally don't carry much cash as a society now. It reminded me of when I owned a pub and used to count the takings.

People no longer see the Free Festival shows as 'well it's free it must be shit' and I don't believe they ever did. This is a nice neat rumour and label put on it by the same people who resent the free shows but have no issue giving out free tickets at a paid venue for a show that can't shift a ticket.

Tax was a well worn phrase when talking about the free venues.

"Yes, but do the free festival comics declare their takings?" one comedy promoter asked me.

I don't think anybody has the right to assume anyone is fucking their taxes based on a dislike of their business model. If you have an issue with people not paying their due tax please go check Gary Barlow, Michelle Mone and some Tory peers before you nitpick at comics you avaricious cunts. While you are at it please make sure the big venues who boast "BEST YEAR EVER" are not putting their profits into an offshore account to avoid taxes in UK.

I pay my tax.

I love the fringe and this year I loved it more. It felt like the old days. It felt good and it felt fair.

I encouraged the people who were skint and living under austerity to come see our shows for free. I also encouraged people who saw the show to take money OUT OF THE BUCKET if they needed some cash. 

Poverty isn't shameful.

Comedy rocks.

Thanks everyone.

My Dad - I will be home.

He is 83 years old and has been the rock of my life. 

His twinkly blue eyes, his impatience with things that take too long to happen and his ability to paint unusual water colours are just three of the things my dad imprinted my DNA with.

Jim, my dad. Twice married and twice widowed. Father to four kids one deceased (My eldest brother Jim) Step dad to two, granddad and great grandad and great great grandad to a heap of kids all who are good at unusual water colours - that's my dad.

The Man who always has a clean laundered handkerchief in his pocket (thanks to his ever attentive son in law who cares for him daily, runs his house, washes his clothes and does all his major care needs ).

We are close, always have been. 

He was and still is a brilliant grandpa to Ashley my daughter. 

He took her holidays, took her swimming, took her to stare at squirrels and helped raise her alongside my beautiful step mum who passed away five years ago.

I called him two years ago from my pals flat in Los Angeles and I heard him having a stroke on the phone. His speech was slurred and his questions were bizarre.

 My heart clenched and I had to hang up on him (not sure if that was the last time I would hear his voice) and contact my husband in Glasgow who took him to hospital and sat by his side for 34 hours. 

I am blessed with good men in my life.

He recovered. Got more frail. No more would he get off the Glasgow subway tube and meet me at the stairs. 

No more would he sit in a cafe with me and flirt with the waitress. 

He was too frail , he became housebound.

Now as time has passed he is slowly succumbing to dementia.

The proud, funny and stubborn old bastard who laughed at my filthiest jokes now calls me to ask when he is going home. "You are home dad" I gulp down the phone standing outside a comedy gig at 11pm at night. People around me are happy and laughing and my heart just feels as though it's cracked like a fragile crystal bauble.

"Well if you won't help me, then that's up to you" He shouts, his voice filled with anxiety and he bangs down his phone.

I have never let my dad down before. Now I am letting him down by assuring him he is safe. I blink tears in the street and run to get a cab to his house.

I hug him when I get into his house. He grabs my hand tight and looks into my eyes and says "Am sorry Janey, I hate being a burden, I love you" and then he puts his warm old hand and lays it on the side of my face and kisses my head. 

My daddy. 

The man who carried me over puddles is back.

"I am off to the fringe for a month dad, please be safe and don't wander outside when am gone I will worry" I say to him.

He smiles and tells me "My legs are fucked, even if I do get outside I can't get far and my son in law will keep an eye on me, get onstage baby it's where you are happy"

Be safe dad. Stay there till I get back. I will be home.

Not Normal

I remember being normal. I was young and worked in a bar and watched normal people do normal things. 

Things like other normal people did. Normal is good, it's a safe place to be. It's the majority.

There were normal people working in normal jobs and who saved up for a yearly holiday and bought washing machines and normal stuff. 

We all came from the normal people, we didn't really know people who did anything different. Maybe the guy who lived in the bus shelter and liked to sing in the style of Al Jolson, he was a bit different but nobody wanted to be him. We liked being normal.

Then one night Jerry Sadowitz walked into my bar with brother Jim (who died a few years ago). Sadowitz did comedy.

This was early 80s nobody did shocking comedy about the Hungerford Shooter. He did. It was funny. It wasn't normal. 

It was literally hysterical and many people claim to be there that night Sadowitz first played the Weavers Inn. 

It became stuff of legend. 

They weren't there. I was there and three other people. It was a normal Tuesday.

He was a comedian and a magician, he did amazing stuff and people loved and hated his jokes. Mostly loved.

He went to the Edinburgh Fringe and did a show. Normal people went through to Edinburgh for the day and watched stuff and came home. He stayed there going onstage every night. 

Who does that?

Years later I stopped being normal. I gave up normality and became one of those people who check mic's and walk behind the stage and talk to people in charge of venues. 

I swapped a yearly holiday and started going for a whole month to someone else's house to stay (which was completely abnormal as I didn't know them) and started getting cold sweats standing onstage saying stuff. 

It wasn't normal. I met artists, actors, musicians and people who also never did normal jobs but travelled about the world talking to audiences and making money standing on stage.

Can you imagine walking onstage and seeing your favourite pop star or actor waiting to hear you speak? 

It's totally not normal. Billy Connolly watching me onstage as he sits with Ashley sharing a pot of tea will never leave my memory.

My daughter Ashley barely recalls normal. Even at thirteen she went to Edinburgh and stopped being a normal kid and became a comedian. 

She never went back to normal. She lived in a world where she understood phrases like 'black out curtains' 'Door splits' '60% in your favour plus a guarantee' and 'green room' that was never ever painted green.

When her teen pals were off to Ibiza for summer hols....she was organising flyering teams, helping the Underbelly guys in the press office and directing a play we wrote in my living room. 

At 16 she was interviewing Russell Brand and Ricky Gervais and getting Meryl Streep mixed up with Glen Close in a dark alleyway on the Cowgate. Poor Meryl Streep her son was in an Underbelly show and Ashley was to get a quote from her on camera....I often wonder what she thought of the tall Scottish teenager who asked her if she has spotted Glen Close.

My husband was never really normal, he quite happily upsticks and moved house for a month every year as he has some gypsy in his blood. He knew the words 'put up' and 'pull down' having been in a caravan carnival family before.

I love being a comedian.

I recall the thrill of standing in a room being nervous with a famous person off the telly being nervous with me. The normal people never see that.

So yet again we are off to Edinburgh Fringe. 

Ashley and I both have shows. 

We will do stuff normal mum and daughter's don't do. 

Like help each other get our room ready for a show. 

Like move into the 18th temporary house of our life. 

Watch each other onstage and organise each other's press release and record our weekly award winning 'only mum and daughter' comedy podcast.

In fact I have just realised.

We are normal...you guys who come to the festival and pay for tickets...that's abnormal you know why? 

Our shows are Free! 

See you in August.

Ashley Storrie is at 6.15pm and am at 7.45pm at Counting House.

I HATE FEMALE COMICS

Just had a fabulous time at Glasgow Stand comedy club.

It's a brilliant comedy club and comics who know the circuit adore it, we all love doing The Stand Comedy Club. 
The sell out crowd were fabulous, the swell of laughter and applause lifted my spirits. I love my job.

I walk off stage and stand at the bar waiting to speak to the staff.

I am elated, it was a belter of a gig and I feel great that I did a good job.

A young man comes over  - I can see it in his eyes...he is going to say it and he does. 

He smiles, grabs my hand and blurts it out -

"My girlfriend at the bar" he points to a young woman in a blue dress who is waving at me "She normally HATES female comics but she loved you" He stands back and waits for me to be amazed at this news. He waits and I stare stonily at him.

My stomach sinks, he is smiling...he is expecting me to throw my arms in the air and yell "WOW I MADE YOUR SEXIST GIRLFRIEND HAPPY....FUCK ME AM SO GRATEFUL THAT SHE LIKES ME".

I stare at him and reply "She HATES ALL women comics? Even the ones she has never seen? Has she ever said 'I HATE ALL male comics?' has those words ever came out of her mouth?" 

He looked stunned "No, she has never said that, she likes male comics". He looks crestfallen that I am not utterly grateful.

I reply "She has never seen a male comic bomb?? Has she seen every male stand up and loved them all? Or does she generally just not like women in their chosen profession?"

"I am trying to give you a compliment" he whines with a hurt face.

"No, you aren't" I explain "First of all she can't speak for herself she has you to speak for her, so this isn't your opinion so am sorry I am saying this to you, but that isn't a compliment. Basically it means she HATES all my friends and my daughter who is a comic and she hasn't met them"

At this the woman comes over. 

He tried to make a face to tell her not to.

She doesn't read his expression as she is too excited to tell me how much she hates all women who tell jokes but not me.

I suspect her surname isn't Pankhurst.

Before she can speak I ask her "What do you do for a job?" she tells me she is a hairdresser as she touches my hair.

I shrug her off and say "I HATE ALL female hairdressers, every single one of them".

She is stunned. Her face is closing in on itself.

I say to her "It's awful isn't it when someone hates what you do for a living without ever seeing your work but just based on your gender? You're the woman who HATES ALL FEMALE COMICS"

She tries to explain "But I do HATE female comics but you changed my mind" She smiles hoping I am going to hug her for this news. Maybe we will swap friendship bracelets or punches...who knows? 

I stare at her and wonder how that can happen? How can a woman HATE all female comics and take the chance on coming to live comedy clubs and not worry she might be faced with a whole night of women comics....THE THING she clearly HATES. 

I am joking....nobody ever wanders into an all female comedy gig at a regular club, THAT never happens unless it's a charity night or something.

I say to her "Can you hear yourself? Why do you HATE all female comics? Did you see one woman who wasn't funny and you just judged a whole gender of comics based on that one experience? Have you ever had shit sex with a bloke and that one guy who ejaculated too quick made you judge all men based on HIS SHIT performance and that made you HATE man sex?"

She blinks and says "I don't think I like you any more".

I reply with a smile and throw up my arms "Good that's you back to HATING all female comics, I wouldn't want you breaking your golden rule of hating women now would I?"

I think I need to learn to deal with this better, but it happens to me and heaps of other female comics every week. I get exhausted dealing with it.

Way to Go SISTER.

PS- She also managed to tell me her female hero was singer from Girls Aloud Cheryl Cole (Ferndandez Versini or whatever man's name she took), the famous toilet boxer that got arrested for attacking a black female toilet attendant over a lollipop incident.

Comedy for kids.

Not many people would assume it was my bag, but I often do Kids Comedy show at The Stand Comedy Club Glasgow. 

I can imagine as you are reading this and if you know me, you might be thinking things like "Did you swear?" of course I didn't. 

I love doing comedy for kids. It can be tough as some kids don't understand that they have to pay attention or maybe they are used to taking over a room with a story and then feel awkward as other kids don't find them as interesting as their own parents probably do.

One Sunday in at the start of the show a wee boy about nine years old kept chatting to me and engaging in long diatribes about dinosaurs. 

He couldn't get away from dinosaurs. His mum looked uncomfortable and was trying to get him to sit quiet. 

The other kids were getting annoyed and parents started looking over at him. He didn't care, he had heaps to say about dinosaurs.

I managed to get him on stage and to name every dinosaur he knew and I could act out it's walking action. He was in heaps of wee giggles as I clearly didn't know what I was doing and was just stomping about the stage making noises. 

To calm him down, I asked him if wanted to host the show with me. He took my hand and we came to an agreement that he could only shout out dinosaur names when I got stuck for material and he would take over.

The audience laughed as he was really having trouble staying quiet and loved it when I would shout "am stuck, give me a dinosaur" and all the kids would scream with laughter at my interpretation.

The wee boy sat with me as the other comics took the stage and he was fine, he was laughing and keeping the dinosaur chat to a minimum.

He was flushed with excitement after the show and his mum came over to tell me how much he enjoyed it. 

She explained that he had Aspergers and doesn't often talk out loud or touch people and this was her first time with him at comedy. 

She told me it was wonderful to see him chat to someone and not get berated or flustered. "To see him onstage holding your hand and laughing was just so lovely" she said. I thanked her.

I explained that he was good fun and that my husband has Aspergers and at that the wee guy butted in and said "Does he know all the dinosaurs?" 

I told him he didn't but my husband was an expert on all things Ancient Rome. I got a quick hug from him and he ran out the door.

When people ask me what my best audience was I tell them it was a nine year old boy who likes dinosaurs.

Being a woman comic, these are things that happen.

1. Watching the hotel receptionist ignore you and speak to your husband, explaining stuff and giving keys out, even though you are paying the bill and the room is in your name (which is entirely different from his).

2. Turning up at a new theatre gig and watch the front of house staff explain to my husband (who drove me there and is only walking me in and is not a comic) where the green room is and shaking his hand, assuming he must be the headline act and not me.

3. Computer staff asking my husband what his job is to get a laptop to suit his needs when in fact it was me who asked them for assistance and he was only standing beside me.

4. People assuming I would wet my knickers to run to the 'Prosecco and Cupcake' table at a charity event.

5. Organisers ignoring every male comic in the room to tell specifically me that 'this event would prefer if swearing was kept to a minimum'.

6. Having a woman apologise in advance for my language at a comedy/political event after four men had sworn onstage before me. She gave them great introductions with no 'bad language' comments.

7. Men asking me what my husband thinks of my job.

8. Women asking me what my husband thinks of my job and did I feel like a bad mother leaving my daughter in her father's care as I pursued my career.

9. Audience member's telling me they don't normally like female comics, but I was good.

10.  People asking me if my comedy is about my vagina and hating men.

11. When explaining my husband doesn't work, having to listen to men assume he must be secretly resentful I make money. You are not allowed to reverse that question on them, apparently that's me being defensive.

12. People asking me if being a 'woman 

comic' is actually a real job.

Come see 2 funny women at Glasgow International Comedy Festival MARCH 2015

Dapper Laughs and Julien Blanc.

In 1979, I recall walking into work in my boyfriend’s dad's pub in the notorious area of The Calton in Glasgow. There seemed to be not many street lights outside and it felt very dark. The pub was full of drunk, young and old men. The only woman in there (other than me) was an ancient old prostitute who sat alone singing into her glass as the guys looked on laughing.

This was the same bar in the early 80s where some of its regulars had gang raped another drunk vulnerable woman and after getting bored with her, slashed her flesh so much that she almost died. Nicholas Fairbairn the infamous politician had to resign as he declared her gang rape and assault as 'not worthy of a trial' as she was a 'damaged woman'. It took a kind hearted lawyer to bring the first civil law suit to jail my customers and they served prison time. It was the Carol X case. Her rapists were guys who drank in my bar.

What am trying to say is some of the Glasgow men back then in The Calton didn't really respect women much. I witnessed this every day in that bar. Women were treated with utter disdain, abuse and I even witnessed women running away from the 'grabbing' men who all laughed heartily at their 'attempted assault'. The guys openly discussed the size of my breasts and sometimes when I ventured out into the main bar area to clear up they would make an effort to curtail their behaviour as my boyfriend's dad was not to be messed with, so I effectively was 'off limits'. I was safe.

Yet I was constantly shocked at the way they spoke about women, for example I had a guy in our bar who used to say he "Tarzaned" women, which was a reference to Tarzan grabbing a woman and swinging her away. 'Tarzaned' can be equally read as raped. Things slowly changed, the area changed, lots of those original guys became heroin addicts and were now not so cocky and either died or faded away or just gave up on life.

The 80s came along and new customers with families and jobs and self employed business's started using the pub and they weren't as 'grabby' or sexist or misogynistic as their predecessors.

But there was still an element of old school sexism in the air. Good news was - it was changing.

It's 2014 and we now have Dapper Laughs and Julien Blanc in the media telling us how to grab women by the throat for a dating technique or  openly laughing at women and asking to 'smell their gash' and generally being demeaned by men in groups. I thought that was done.

 I had hoped the term 'Tarzaned' was an isolated Glasgow urban myth....but its back and people now pay to hear it. Maybe I should open a 1979 theme bar and have men grabbing women as blokes laugh at the hilarity and we can have Dapper Laughs Vines on a loop, girls can giggle as they are throttled near the juke box and women can scream with pleasure at being noticed as they try to hide the smell of their gash near the boys!

Or men like Dapper Laughs and Julien Blanc can grow the fuck up and people who pay to see them can realise that one day their own daughters, sisters and female pals will suffer from this perpetuated 'lad syndrome' and maybe one day if things change WOMEN ONE DAY can walk into a bar without fear or humiliation from badly raised stupid men.

So thanks for reading, if you want follow me on twitter @JaneyGodley for updates and daily shenanigans.

Sorry my blog's have been less regular than promised...been hectic.

Booking a Comedy Club...hence am a promoter!

Wild Cabaret is a stunning venue in Glasgow's Merchant city.

Not your usual comedy venue that boasts a dark cellar and angry hipster barman whose girlfriend looks like a Govan version of Uma Thurman and they argue every time you try to introduce a nervous new comedian or he decides his 'mates band' are playing that night, just when you get a decent following.

The carpet doesn't smell weirdly of a deep clean from folk in hazmat suits or even stick to your feet and they have more than an angle poise lamp to light up the stage.....and you get paid in cash on the night! Weird eh?

What is going on with all this professionalism Godley? I hear you ask.

Well Glasgow boasts great comedy nights and there should be sticky carpets and angry barmen and weird lighting, that's how comedy works as well, trust me, it's where I learned my stripes playing.

But Wild Cabaret in Candleriggs is a bona fide cabaret venue with proper posh food and waiters who walk about so well dressed I constantly think they own the joint and keep suggesting new ideas about comedy to their confused faces as they try to take orders. They ignore me and smile. Bless them. I love the place.

It can be a hard thing introducing comedy to folk who are trying to order truffle laden ox blood marrow boned sausages. You are trying to explain a story about mild near death masturbation as they whisper "medium rare please" but we are getting there.

Am joking about the sausages but not about the masturbation joke as there is a white rope above the stage for those folk who dress like cats and do cabaret at the weekend, which I am assured is awesome and it keeps triggering my joke about men who choke themselves during a 'pleasure session'. Some people laugh.

Some Thursday's it's full other times it's not as busy, but we are getting a good solid crowd and it's my job to programme it and am rubbish at that part. I don't mean we haven't had good comics but I wake up at 4am in tangled sheet panicking that I haven't booked any acts that week and so grab my phone and check again and again.

Scottish comics have emailed me suggesting their availability and I forget to put them into a file to get back to them, so now people think I don't like them and you know how well liked I am to begin with, it's a vicious circle.

I am trying to make sure I get everyone on, the pay isn't stunning but at least in these climes of comedy clubs being crap at paying people, you get cash on the night.

I forget every week to announce the line up on social media and then I remember and hastily send it out 500 times just to make sure am annoying people all over the world as well as at home.

The owner of the club is brilliant and takes on board all the suggestions I come up with and even has posters of my giant face around the city centre on bill boards. 

The staff are fabulous and move between the tables like members of the CIA taking orders and rarely shake a cocktail when folk are onstage, in fact one barman shakes his thing in the side kitchen for convenience and often makes cocktails in there as well (BOOM BOOM).

We have awesome deals on like the £15 (was £30) two course meal with a glass of wine AND comedy ticket for Thursday nights. That's a cracking deal eh? If you just want comedy its £8 and you sit on beautiful seats or in a stunning booth!

There are no sight line problems and the toilets are fabulous and don't double up as the acts room, we have a great green room back stage with our own loo.

The problem is, trying to merge posh food and a beautiful room with stand up...they can be weird bedfellows but I don't see why it can't happen.

Why does comedy club food have to be fried and flung at you with cheap cutlery and plastic glasses?

Why can't we eat salmon mousse from beautiful plates and drink from crystal glasses and still laugh?

We will and we ARE! So come down to Wild Cabaret JUST COMEDY on a Thursday night, you will see half price offers on facebook and twitter.

I will be the frazzled panicky woman staring at a white rope above the stage trying to avoid a strangly wank joke.
 
So thanks for reading, if you want follow me on twitter @JaneyGodley for updates and daily shenanigans.

Sorry my blog's have been less regular than promised...been hectic.

Swearing

Picture the scene, I walk out of a gig at Edinburgh fringe, it's raining and am laughing and saying goodbye to some folks and I get straight into a cab as someone shouts "Loved the show Janey" and the taxi driver asks "Are you a comedian?" I reply quite proudly "Yes I am" and I forgot in my elation that I usually don't speak about comedy in taxi's as I know what he is going to say next...I forgot and before I could think another thing I heard him say the inevitable "Do you swear?".
 

I have my stock answer "I don't swear anymore than the male comics or less than the local priest".
 

That usually makes them look into their mirror and then I hear him say "Ah...your one of those feminist women" as if the only way I could possibly answer them back is because I have a political agenda and some buckwheat sandals that I wear as I breastfeed foundlings on my lactating pendulous braless titties.
 

"No more a feminist than most of the male comics but usually more than the local priest, have you ever asked a male comic if he swears?" I add and hopefully this will end this painfully awkward corner we have talked our way into.
 

I just pull on my headphones (always great to get out of these situations) and nod to music as he mouths some shit I cannot hear but his eyebrows look knotted and angry.
 

I don't know why 'swearing' is something that female's have to be told not to do. Is it really that bad? Has anyone ever really hated Kevin Bridges, Frankie Boyle and Billy Connolly's language onstage to the point where they discuss with a pursed mouth?
 

Dara O'Briain says the word 'Feck' live on television, we all know it means 'fuck' does Dara get belittled for being an uneducated ill-informed swearer? No, he doesn't he is one of Ireland's most intelligent funny men.
 

So it is a class issue? I have seen very well spoken middle class English women swear in comedy and somehow it is more acceptable, especially if said by 'apparent slip of the tongue' or by the medium of a 'puppet' (see Nina Conti's filthy mouthed Monkey).
 

Does my swearing sound worse because I am a working class Scottish woman?
 

If I was a Oxbridge graduate swearing onstage would it be seen as 'urban and gritty' like a hipster getting angry at a flat tyre but in my accent does it sound really harsh and filthy and all you hear is a slovenly washer woman taking us back years with her filthy language?
 

Recently I attended a "Vote Yes" event for Scottish creative's.
 

All lovely people, authors, musicians in a Glasgow basement.
 

The male author swore, the musician had some choice language in his songs and not a word was spoken, but the female (who spouts the values a gender equality independence group) got up to introduce me she told the audience...
 

"Next up is comedian Janey Godley, she might use offensive language so if you are easily offended, please bear this in mind".


I walked to the stage so angry. I know she didn't do it to hurt me but despite being part of a gender equality group she was hardwired to apologise for a woman before that woman spoke. She never apologised after the men onstage swore. I never got that chance. The audience were told I was probably going to be offensive.
 

One day this will end.
 

So thanks for reading, if you want follow me on twitter @JaneyGodley for updates and daily shenanigans.
 

Janey Godley’s Podcast Episode 215

(Please be aware that this Podcast Contains strong language)

In episode 215 of Janey Godley's podcast, the comedy duo are a day late and Ashley is so hoarse of the throat she can hardly speak. Janey discusses her choice to support the YES campaign and they both talk about the awful patronising Better Together advert that made them change their mind.


Ashley debates the US gun laws as a child shoots an instructor with a machine gun. The news that Ashley's radio pilot is broadcast on Monday 1st September on BBC Radio Scotland is met with much delight.


Mother and Daughter comedy team get to natter and the world gets to hear it on Janey Godley’s podcasts, expect some bawdy language and home truths, as Janey Godley and Ashley Storrie lead you down the roads less taken in their fantastic weekly podcast. Listen as mother and daughter banter, bait and burst with laughter.


Janey Godley Podcast at: Episode 215


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