mostly david ephgrave

This turning 41 lark is a bit of a funny one. While last year's birthday was one to be aware of, this year has made me a smidge more melancholy. Only a bit, though. I'm well aware of how these little emotional peaks and troughs fluctuate, and consequently, I try not to read too much into them. Reflection can be a poisoned chalice, and I've had a lot of reasons to look back lately, which were bound to affect me, so I'm trying not to overthink it. I try not to get too drawn into what doesn't matter now. The online world is a case in point. It only takes a quick browse of Instagram or Facebook to be confronted by at least three things that'll make you feel shit, particularly if you're not in the habit of carefully cultivating your social media presence. You start being bothered by stuff you'd never consider in real life.  "Why wasn't I invited to this terrible event I'd despise if I'd attended?" Why does everyone look so happy in this ...

I’ve been feeling low-level nauseous all day today; just enough to make the day generally unpleasant without things coming to a head or me being sick so I could then move on from it. I don’t know why this was the case, though it may have something to do with meeting my friend Steve for a catch-up yesterday, though I only had a glass of wine when I was with him so I doubt it was that, though it may have been the food I ate. Whatever the case it’s just been frustrating, as it’s put a damper on the whole day I could have done without. Despite what may have been some questionable fish and chips I had a good time yesterday. We’ve been fortunate enough to see each other pretty regularly since Steve moved away, though I of course preferred when he was in the area. Steve’s much like me in the sense he’s not on Facebook so doesn’t play that whole game; a game that frequently makes me feel I’m on the outside of the grid just because I’m not taking part. I guess in many ways I keep myself...

The internet sometimes conspires to make you feel like an outsider. This is particularly the case if you opt out of the horrendous social media conventions we’re all expected to be a part of. Facebook’s the big ugly one for me; I joined it a few years after it started, largely to help promote mine and Glyn’s first Edinburgh run in 2008. Once on it, I’d use it both as a chance to try out jokes (as that’s always been my way) and to keep in touch with friends - though before long, my friend list stretched far further than just the people I was close to, to people I’d only just met; it turned new friendships into acquisitions with a Pokémon “Gotta Catch ‘Em All” aftertaste. A few years later, I deactivated my account because it felt unhealthy. Every so often, I restart it, but each time I do, it makes me feel more out of step, and if the algorithms don’t add up and my posts are missed, I wind up feeling lonely too; so much for bring people together. ...

Tonight, I met with a friend for what ended up being a very comical evening. It’s nice when you can know someone for such a long time and still find topics to discuss and things to be amused by. There aren’t many with whom this sort of relationship can continue, seemingly indefinitely, with scope for endless material. We regularly prefigure points of conversation with “I may have told you this before”, yet impressively, we still find things we haven’t brought up; having known each other for over twenty years, I can’t help but wonder when the well will run dry and we’ll have to resort to sitting in silence. It seems as you get older your friendship group diminishes, or perhaps this is just the case with me. I have a lot of acquaintances, but there are only a tight handful who are truly close friends; some I see more than others, yet when we do meet up, very little has changed. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with keeping your community small. We weren’t designed to f...

Since returning to Facebook largely for work reasons, I can truly see why I decided to come off. Maybe it’s my perception of it, or maybe it’s down to a few people within my network, but browsing the social media Goliath usually only serves to make me feel bad about my life. From behind the rose-tinted filter of Facebook everyone’s having a better time than you. They’re happier, better looking, more successful and more financially solvent and their friends a lot more interested in what they’re up to. You’re the sweaty Gollum-like outcast peering through a steamed-up window at the party you weren’t invited to; with a bit of luck you mind find a bit of cake in the bin around the back that hasn’t been tainted by other rubbish. I’ve written about my distaste for Facebook more than once here, so you’d think I'd have learnt my lesson. Sadly not; it drags you in like the misery porn of a road traffic accident, leaving you lonely and maladjusted to the...

Either people don’t like jokey Facebook statuses any more, or I’m no longer funny. When I first joined the social networking service back in 2008 (I remember the year because it coincided with me and Glyn taking The Balloon Debate to Edinburgh) that was pretty much all anyone did, apart from those annoyingly vague, fishing-for-sympathy-without-telling-you-what-the-problem-is posts; if there’s something wrong, tell us, or don’t if you expect us to tease it out of you. (I’m an irritable, impatient person in case haven't guessed. ) You were initially encouraged to write in a ‘David Ephgrave is…’ format, which cried out to be completed with surreal statements like ‘...half-Alsation’ or ‘...his own dad’. Then they simplified things by removing the prefix, opening the door to post anything you liked, from how tired you were to what you had for lu nch . Back then, we were all younger, and people of my generation probably didn’t have kids or mortgage payments to contend...

One thing I hate, but seem to spend much of my life doing, is self-promoting. Today’s a case in point. I’ve only been home from my holiday for a few hours, yet the time's been devoted to spreading the word about next week’s Leicester Square Theatre gig , both to agents and our Mostly Comedy mailing list. If you scan your eyes over the last sentence, you’ll see I never miss a trick, as I’ve included a booking link within it. If you hold the internet-enabled device you’re reading this blogpost on up to the light, you’ll see a sneaky watermark of my face mouthing the words ‘COME AND SEE ME NEXT TUESDAY’. Don’t ask me how I did it, as I haven’t thought the mechanics through. Despite being a self-advertising monstrosity, I feel desperately uncomfortable with it. I hate the idea that people think I’m always doing it, or that I only get in contact when I want something. Facebook's a good example: I left the social media platform a couple of years ago because I didn’t like...

A while ago, I heard Paul McCartney describe the lyric "everybody else is busy doing better than me" from his recent song 'Alligator' in an interview as being a comment on how he'll often look at how his work is perceived in comparison to others and be frustrated by it. I find this incredibly comforting. If a man who's achieved so much can look at his work and find it wanting, then we're allowed to do it too. It's a part of human nature, magnified by our current Facebook-and-Twitter culture. Everywhere we look, we're confronted by people presenting happier, more contented lives through their social media press releases; smearing Vaseline over the lens before they make their public broadcast. There's someone busy doing better than you, just a mouse-click away.  I wish I could remove myself from this unnecessary comparison and jealously, and see it for what it is: a falsity. But though I'm aware of all of it, I still do it. It's instinc...

I think the concept of National Siblings Day is clutching at straws.  This could be because I haven’t got a brother or sister. “Ich bin ein Einzelkind”, as my German doppelgänger would say. While I have no siblings, I can imagine what it would be like. I’d cherish it, despite the frequent frustration it would bring. Either way, I wouldn’t need to tell the world about it. I wouldn’t need a public holiday or a Twitter trend to express it. Our mutual respect could be kept between ourselves. (...assuming we were of similar mindset.) Siblings aren't an endangered species. We don’t need to fight for their rights. Before you know it, there'll be an In-laws Day. Scrap that, there already is: Do we have to turn everything outward? You’re no better a relation for showing your relationship off. Life isn’t a press release; it’s what happens behind closed doors that counts (unless you’re feral). I blame Facebook. It’s turned life into a competition – and on...

I have a bit of a love / hate relationship with Facebook: I love to hate it. Despite writing a daily blog and tweeting incessantly, it might surprise people to learn that I’m actually very private. I’ll use social media as an excuse to work up ideas and force a little creativity – but when it comes to Facebook, I’ll keep myself to myself. I joined it reluctantly, on the eve of mine and Glyn ’s first Edinburgh Festival. Doggett & Ephgrave had been ‘trading’ for a couple of years with us making little money from it (some things never change). All of a sudden we needed to find somewhere in the region of £8,000 - £10,000 to fund our trip to Scotland; a number of fund-raising events were hastily organized, and Facebook seemed the best (and cheapest) way to promote them. I sometimes worry that the way I use Facebook gets on people’s nerves; you may not want to be constantly confronted by things I find amusing, or information about our latest...

Last night I tweeted that a contestant on BBC1’s popular game show Pointless looked like a tiny-faced Bobby Davro. It was just a silly little joke – a prerequisite of my job: making silly little jokes – but within the space of a few hours, that silly little joke had been spotted, commented on and then retweeted by the contestant in question. Now, I think it’s safe to assume he wasn’t particularly offended; the smiley face and subsequent retweets by him and his fellow teammate would suggest as much. He may even be enjoying the novelty of the temporary fame that appearing on a game show has given him. However, Davrogate does serve to illustrate that the nature of modern social media means you’re potentially just a few short internet steps from direct contact with the person you may be commenting on. This is not the first time I have been stung by this - though thankfully, each incident has been fairly innocuous. A year or so ago I watched an excellent BBC1 d...