Edinburgh Fringe

John Kearns in his show 'Schtick'

One of the benefits of having children at university in other parts of the country is that you get to visit those places.  

Carenza and I set off on a girls’ trip to visit her godmother Charlotte in Glasgow and Pascoe in Edinburgh.  It was great to catch up with Charlotte and Robert, and when we reached Edinburgh, Pascoe with huge generosity gave us his room and bedded down in the shared sitting room. 

However, the Edinburgh Fringe Festival hijacked the trip.  

None of us had been before, although Nigel and I did once set off in a mini which broke down half an hour from home.  The Edinburgh Fringe is a matter of such complexity that at first we were overwhelmed by the multiple telephone-directory-sized programmes, the hundreds of venues, and the constant press of people shoving flyers into our hands.  

But we soon got the hang of it.

Pascoe is an obliging person, prepared to play along with a joke, so it was inevitable he would end up on stage:  I guess when you’ve been up in front of an audience, sitting on a bar stool, wearing a blonde wig, sipping a tia maria and lucozade with comedian John Kearns sitting on your knee you definitely can say you’ve been to the Fringe.