Back at the Edinburgh Fringe"

Well, after my rant about ideas that we could use to deter rioters, both on here and on Twitter, I was pleasantly surprised that the vast majority of people came out in favour and only two went the 'do gooder' route. In the midst of it all I thought about those countries that remove the right hand of thieves...

There was a play I once saw on TV with a detective walking along a country lane and he met an old man leaning on a fence who expressed his sympathy for the police (even then) because the old man felt that the courts were not backing up the police work with strong enough sentences. 'We need more deterrent. We need to take something from them that they really cherish to make them stop and think before they commit the crime.' "Like what?" asked the copper. The old man didn't hesitate. 'Their testicles' he said.

The detective visibly rocked back and said something like "That's horrific. You couldn't do that."

'Oh', said the old man (and I have often thought about this over the years....) 'You wouldn't have to do many...................'

Meanwhile, back at the Fringe we did a great radio interview yesterday in a tiny studio high up in a tower all manned by good, happy, laughing young students and it was a pleasure to be with them. FreshAir radio is on line.

Then off to do Capital Radio, a phone interview for a Magic site, and then Radio Forth who were raving about the bit I did on their charity show the other night. All in all a nice day, and this morning I even got a 'rave' email about a gag I put in last night...

"I have seen a lot of comedians already this year but not topped your comment on stage last night about being fed up over the years with American TV shows going on and on about 'where you in 'nam?' 'I was in 'nam' and so on. When you said that now it was going to be in all our TV dramas 'I was in 'nam...................................Tottenh..............'am' I nearly fell off my chair laughing. I never realised that you did gags or were so up to date and topical. Great gag Paul and thanks for a great show" Nice one.

Debbie Irish family came over to see the show and we went for dinner later with them. The big surprise was the 13 year old's BRILLIANT designs on T shirts. Watch out for the future designer!