I am awoken by my friend Josie’s children. Fortunately, despite the hour being unearthly, they are highly entertaining, so the dust in my eyes does not irritate and the conversations around the Cheerios are both absurd and informative. Tonight, I am at the Community Bookshop in Edinburgh, a venture that makes money for a different charity each month.
On my way, I stop at Elvis Shakespeare, a regular haunt for vinyl and books about outsider art. In Argonaut Books, a little further down, I ask if they’d like me to sign the copy of my book they have in stock and comment on the pile of books at the counter by Camilla Grudova.
“She is such a brilliant writer.”
“Why don’t you tell her, she’s sat over there having a coffee?” And so I do.
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Then to Aberdeen. The sun has now bowed out – why not? It was a splendid final appearance – and I walk through more drizzle to a new independent bookshop, Somerville Books where I recite a poem about my childhood dreams of being a vampire.
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Mark Steel calls me. “What do you want? I’m in Aberdeen.”
“SO AM I! We’re playing the same venue.” Mark had wondered why his sales were down. It turns out Aberdeen has an embarrassment of riches (equally shared in a Marxist manner) of left-wing comedians to watch tonight. I know most of Mark’s audience and he knows most of mine. We aim to come together at the end of his show.
Dave Ball from Soft Cell has died so we rehearse “Say Hello, Wave Goodbye” in Mark’s dressing room. Sadly, my show overruns and I miss my chance, but it was a hell of a rehearsal. We go drinking with audience members, face last orders twice, and are the last to leave a pub twice.
Friday is spent standing all the way from Aberdeen to Manchester. I don’t mind. I have the vestibule to myself and I look out of the window at meadows and almost-mountains and build up a photo diary of pylons and sheep. I’m off to the final QEDcon. It is a conference of compassionate scepticism. Not wise-guy academics mocking, but dealing with real issues that arise from misinformation, disinformation and failures in education.
I watch talks on myths spread about rape by Lucia Osborne Crowley, author of The Lasting Harm; the historical arrogance of western science by Subhadra Das; and then see Dr Abby Philips win The Ockham award for sceptical campaigning. He is a doctor in India who is fighting against pseudomedicine that is severely injuring and killing people. His campaigning has cost him greatly.
Throughout the week, I have seen kindness and activism and love. It’s been a good week.
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I feel more armed for the next one.
Robin Ince is a comedian, poet and broadcaster.
Ice Cream for a Broken Tooth: Poems about life, death, and the odd bits in betweenby Robin Ince is out now (Flapjack Press, £12).
You can buy it from the Big Issue shop on bookshop.org, which helps to support Big Issue and independent bookshops.
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