Day 9 - Aberdeen
On the road to Aberdeen we stop at Glamis castle to take in a brown sign and some Scottish culture. It's a lovely building, not what you'd classically call a castle.A few photos then on to our destination.
I'm beginning to loathe touch screen technology with a passion. We are in apartment which has a kitchenette and two fancy modern hobs which I can be buggered if I can get working. I have to press down hard on the glass surface to get them to come on so I can cook some actual real food instead of the crap I've been eating all week. What a useless piece of tosh. When Charlie finally gets it working I make spicy meatballs. This calms me down, but then when I go to turn the hobs off the glass buttons are *****ing hot!!! Well done whoever made that, we're going backwards I tell you. Buttons are good, remember buttons? That you can press? They make a reassuring clicking noise.
Anyway, Aberdeen music hall is massive and wonderful, and tonight is a big crowd, five hundred or so. The tech's are big personalities and doing the sound test is evidence of the size. Big acoustic's for a big room, so on the night I deliver my set ever so slightly slower and get a great response, It's a good feeling.

Day 10 – Dundee
My life could have been very different, in the early ninetie's I was interviewed for a placement at Dundee art college, and I really wanted to get in as it was well known in comic book circles as a place where some of the better 2000ad artists graduated from. I went through quite an intimidating visual assessment of my work, and I could see the other candidates were really good. It didn't happen and this is the first time I've visited since.

Strathcaro cafe services is the oddest services I've ever been in, the whole building is held together by screws and sellotape, they industrial size bags of cat litter, toys, plants and there is a full size model horse in the window. Signs are all hand painted and say things like 'We have a choice of soups'. Onwards.

The Caird hall is even bigger than Aderdeen, genuinely huge, and for our purposes partitioned for the show. It's a good show, if hard work filling such an enormous space. Charlie has a great one. Afterwards we drink in 'The Pillars' a proper Scottich pub, in the opposite room a band is playing called 'Salty Dog' and we are convinced we are being followed by increasingly bad renditions of Alanis Morrisette songs. The hotel has two different weddings going, with kilts aplenty. I could sleep for a week.

Day 11 – Livingston
Halfway between Edinburgh and Glasgow is Livingston, a small town with one of the biggest Asda's I've ever seen. Scarily big - and the whole town are in there. I've been trying not to shop at the big corporate's, but it's really hard not to when you're on the road. Not knowing where to get stuff or where places are, it's a mixture of comfort and dissapointment to see a chain store.
The venue is in a residential area, which feels odd, then we see it...

That can't be right? Fortunetly we follow the narrow road a bit further.

I look out the window of the next hotel, they are all blurring together. An ice cream van passes by playing the theme tune from 'the third man'. There was an ice cream van where I lived as a kid that did the same. Spooky.

Day 6 - Newcastle Upon Tyne
Try as we might we couldn't cancel the guest house in Dunstable the previous night to make a bit of headway on the road North. The landlady and her massive dog - with a tongue like carwash roller - was adamant we must endure her hospitality, despite the fact that the lad on the desk looked us in the eye and admitted he didn't know what he was doing.
A long drive next morning was rewarded with the emotional sight of the Tyne's many bridges, hello Newcastle, I miss you.
My lass flies home from the states today, she left before the tour started and it'll be another week or so before I see her, she send's me messages using a combination of phone text, smart phone app and facebook. I have a new HTC phone and it's driving me nuts. I cannot keep track. Hello Bron, I miss you.
The Tyne Theatre itself is a beautiful venue, I'd seen Jonny Vegas here in 2002 and now poster's for Sarah Millican adorn the wall, nice. They still make hand painted signs that hang outside the venue advertising the shows. I want to bring my own show here sooooo much. The tech's are chatty, the very definition of 'canny'. We share some 'on the road' stories, and later the show is very canny too, maybe the best yet. Some mates from way back come and watch, they loved it, I loved doing it, it's all beautiful. Again it's the old theatre's that are the better ones, they feel both vast and intimate at the same time.
I stay at my folks, my mum has made biscuits and also her own recipie bread. It's late. i'm hungry. I watch doctor again. I must be tired and emotional. I'm so happy I could cry.

Day 7 - Consett
I used to hate it up here. The Durham/Northumberland border is gorgeous country, but in my early twenties living outside Durham for a couple of years there was simply nothing to do. The venue is nice enough and easy to get to, but If anything it's me thats a little off form. After the high's of Newcastle, try as I might, I'm not feeling it tonight. There is a chatty lady in the house, as it turn's out she is a 'behavioral specialist'. Go figure. Charlie is staying in the Derwent valley hotel, which used to be owned by Rowan Atkinson apparently. It over looks the Derwent Valley (doh) and some amazing views, on the way back after the show I get a great photo of the sunset, thank you Consett and goodnight.

Day 8 - Glenrothes
Tarmac is bleeding out of my ears. It's only as we drive into Glethrothes from Consett after five and a half hours that it dawns on me that I pressed 'no' to toll roads on the satnav, taking us a whole hour and a half longer to get to the venue by avoiding the fourth bridge and driving right round the not insubstantial coastline of Scotland. Fife, We have no business being anywhere near there. The venue is the Rothes hall and is capacious. I still have my make-shift empty pot noodle tub drinking recepticle. It has already com in handy on several occasions. My missus made it back into the country without incident, a thought on my mind since the americans shot Cat Stevens in the teatowel. Today is full of win so far.