The gig on twitter

Last night I did a gig from home, it wasn’t one of my crazy laughterinoddplaces ideas, but instead I was doing the funny, or at least attempting to, on the internet.

It was all the idea of Tiernan Douieb, another prolific twitterer, and he’d asked me a while ago if I’d be up for trying this crazy idea out. I said yes and then didn’t think much about it.

But seeing as the last gig I got Tiernan to do was the disastrous charity gig in someone garden and then the last time we gigged was another disastrous charity affair I got scared that we had some kind of curse. But thank fuck this gig wasn’t for charity.

The line up was good, the technology was iffy and the headlining idea was news-grabby. So much in fact that it’s been pretty much fucking everywhere and the twitter account for the gig had about 7,000 followers or somesuch.

It meant I think we all got the fear a bit, it was like chatting on your own on the internet, and yet also like doing the biggest gig of your life all at the same time.

I’ve been doing a new bit in my set for the last few weeks about a trip to the doctors, and I thought that this might be ripe for some tweeting. I’d been meaning to write it all down and sort it out for weeks, but in typical Terryland way didn’t really start until yesterday afternoon, and then realised what a mammoth job I had in hand. Not least writing out this whole story that I’ve never written down, but breaking it into 140 character tweets, and then trying to make as many of them funny in they’re own right as possible.

I was geeky, I used my tweetie client on my mac and open up 60ish new tweet windows, then copy and pasted each tweet into place. Even more geeky was that I plugged my telly into my computer to have enough screen space to put them all on. I just had to post each one every ten second or so and all would go well.

But my mac is a bit old and I was terrified all this tweet strain would make it crash right on cue.

As the comedy began the system of us comics having our own hashtag for the gig for people to follow proved clumsy as cunts used it to try and be funny, or a lot of people tweeted trying to tell people not to tweet with it, whilst tweeting with it. It was a bit messy and and some of the hecklers were the worst kind: faceless ones on the internet that don’t have to actually speak in public, or touch a girl.

As the night went on it seemed that one-liners were the best format for this kind of gig, I was beginning to get scared that my long story was going to sink without a trace.

Like real comedy gigs it was over-running to buggery but this meant that most of the internet cunts had gotten bored and had gone back to second life to show off to their ‘friends’ how they had heckled at a ‘gig’ done by ‘comedians’

Soon it was over to me, except that I was following (in both a gigging and twittering sense Gary Delaney, who’s one-liners are nothing short of legendary, also meaning that my set was peppered with people retweeting his quite excellent jokes.

Another problem was the tweet limit, none of us knew of this, but to stop spamming there is a max number of tweets per hour, it seems to be about 50, my 65 tweet story was in trouble. But luckily, tweetie can switch logins from within a new post screen, the poor followers of my f1 podcast were in for a confusing night.

I began, it seemed to go well, watching my tweets disappear of the big LCD telly made it feel a bit like mission control at NASA. All was going smoothly, but my original plan to retort to any heckles was shushed by the approaching tweet limit, tho luckily, didn’t even get twat-heckled that much.

As the set drew to a close all of my tweets were being sent, it was amazing, was I immune from the tweet limit? Did I tick a box marked whimsy when I signed up?

No. Tiernan messaged me on gtalk to ask if I’d finished. I refreshed my twitter screen to see that the last 15 hadn’t gone through, and I had been blocked on a tumultuous cliffhanger of a tweet “Embarrassing, but it’s my duty to spread the word of…”

Had I gone all arty and ended on a confusion? Fuck no, I had the end to do and a pic to post, I quickly copied and pasted and typed and panicked the last few tweets, having lost the prepared ones to the ether.

It was only this morning that I realised that a picture that I spent ages drawing didn’t even make it up there last night. But technical problems aside it all seemed to work… ish.

I managed to vandalise wikipedia too, which pissed off @knellr and it was taken down pretty quick, but I took a screen grab, which I’ve included below where I have re-created the entire story here, in 140 character blocks….

Ta @tiernandouieb and hello twits. Normally doing standup I’m let down by my appalling mic techinique – but my typing speed is 74 wpm #tcgig

In fact, I once used it to wow a small Jewish woman in a Golders Green temping agency who refused to believe a man could type so fast #tcgig

Ha, I’m smoking in a comedy club, take that, the law #tcgig

But I am not here to tell you about impressing religious people with my (nothing short of epic) admin skills. But I could, I so could #tcgig

Reluctantly, the story of racing a priest to the end of his hail mary with a mail merge will have to wait #tcgig (suffice to say, I did win)

By the way, if you are a spotify user, fire it up now. We might need some mood affecting music in a bit #tcgig

A special hello to UK twits, but only indigenous ones, so none of you descended from Viking or Roman occupation #tcgig #nickgriffinisacunt

I am trying to raise awareness. I had a health scare recently, not a bad one, but enough to convince me I was definitely going to die #tcgig

It happened one morning, when I woke up to find that overnight three body parts had conspired against me and resigned from my cabinet #tcgig

1 of 3: MY LEFT EYE WAS ALL SWOLLEN UP. I hadn’t gotten punched or stuck things in it the night before. So this was a bit of a worry #tcgig

2 of 3: MY LEFT NOSTRIL WAS SWOLLEN UP AND BLOCKED. I had a bogey I was saving for the morning that I now couldn’t reach. More worry #tcgig

These two things weren’t really a major concern. That was until I noticed @terrysaunders symptoms 3 of 3: MY LEFT TESTICLE WAS ACHING #tcgig

If it was then it really wasn’t as exciting as the adverts would have you believe http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=df9KNfvH5yQ #tcgig

I got to the doctors as quick as I could, battling through the swine flu panickers (aah swine flu, remember that? #ilovemay2009 ) #tcgig

For the first time in my life it happened: The doctor was significantly younger than me. Certainly young enough to make me feel old #tcgig

How young can you be to be a qualified doctor at? Answers on a hashtag please #doctorsarethisoldterry #tcgig

This one looked about 17. When a testicle is aching I’d prefer an older doctor, in a bowtie and preferably holding a baby (see fig 1) #tcgig

“Fig 1″

And she was an attractive female. I was about to insist she looked at at least half of my testicles. I began to wish I’d washed. #tcgig

I told her what ailed me. Beginning with eye, trying to delay mentioning my unmentionables. Moving down to the nose. Then I paused. #tcgig

I had this worry I always get at doctors. Should you use medical terms to or the words you’d normally use? #testiclesorballs? #tcgig

To my eternal shame I went with the latter, and actually said “It’s my balls, doc.”. I said “Doc”. NB: I am not Bugs Bunny. #tcgig

It would be easy to slip in that she smiled a bit at my words. But the truth is she looked an uneasy mix of scared and disgusted. #tcgig

Though she wouldn’t be the first woman with that look on her face upon viewing my testes. #tcgig #bodoom-tsh

She checked my eye, it was a stye. I’m not entirely sure what a stye is, but she reassured me that it definitely wasn’t a cataract #tcgig

Onto the nose. She told me what it was, and you never feel like you’ve wasted NHS time more until a doctor says to you “It’s a spot” #tcgig

So far my hypochondria wasn’t justified, I hoped something was seriously wrong with the ball or I was really going to look stupid #tcgig

Leading me to a bed with a roll of paper on it she pulled a curtain, between me and the door “in case anyone comes in” #tcgig

I began to strip, she asked me what I did for a living. I told her I was a comedian “Dressed like that I thought you were a musician” #tcgig

I wasn’t sure if this was because I was wearing skinny jeans or the fact that they were round my ankles, like a musician (see fig 2) #tcgig

“Fig 2″

She came into my curtained area, I’d made a fatal error. I should have pulled both jeans and pants* in one move, now I was trapped. #tcgig

*for american followers, that’s jeans and underpants #tcgig

Now that I had to peel my pants down in front of a woman, I tried not to think sexy, but I couldn’t get a certain song out of my head #tcgig

http://open.spotify.com/track/4HIjW90Up9lXAxAmdxTa72 for spotifiers #tcgig

What is the protocol? Whip them down quick, like a plaster? Or peel them down slow? Which is least sexy? #tcgig

Arguably it’s going to be unsexy if its me doing the peeling (see fig. 2 again, but I would welcome tweets protesting this) #tcgig

She finally got around to inspecting my poor aching testicle. Now, in my memory, she was kneeling down. I’m not entirely sure she was #tcgig

She said it seems to be fine, but she just had to check the other one too. Though at no point did she have them both in hand at once #tcgig

for the first time I looked up, away from her medical hands. I noticed something about the room that had previously escaped me #tcgig

There was a window. And where the curtain had been pulled to cover the door it had pulled the other side round revealing the window #tcgig

This window had its own curtains open and it looked out to street level. thereby people could see in. And could see this view (Fig 3) #tcgig

“Fig 3″

I didn’t have the heart to tell her, she asked me what kind of comedy I do, I saw a child pointing at me from a pushchair #tcgig

I told her I just tell stories about things that happen to me in my life. She said “I hope you’re not going to talk about me” #tcgig

I resisted saying “Well I wasn’t going to until you inspected my aching ball in full view of the world” in case she gave me something nasty #tcgig

She said she was going to send me for a scan, saying that “if something was to be wrong I’d feel terrible” I told her I’d feel worse #tcgig

And so I went and got my left bolloack bombarded with ultrasound (the best kind of sound) and sticky gel #tcgig

Should point out though, I had to wait to be referred, took ages. But like an iphone ad, steps have been removed in this story #tcgig

The hospital, full of the dead and notso dead, scared me.The ultrasound doctor wasn’t as cool as his job title would have you believe #tcgig

I’d gotten quite used to the ache. Like an old friend. The doctor was an older man, wearing a bowtie and bizarrely, holding a baby #tcgig

He made me strip, I’d counteracted my earlier problems by wearing those trousers what strippers wear that tear off…and no underpants! #tcgig

It was identical (the scan) to the what women have are pregnant (testicles aside), when they point out the babies arm and that #tcgig

Not that he ever pointed at an image of my testicle and said “there’s its arm” #tcgig

He started to click, scan and whistle (I wasn’t comfortable about that) but I couldn’t see the screen. They were my balls, not fair #tcgig

After about ten mins of this he pulled the screen round. He pointed at a dark line on the image of second favourite ball and said…. #tcgig

“You see that worm, there” Those were the words he used. Worm…worm. he carried on… #tcgig

“That’s a clump of veins that might be causing the aching.” #tcgig

I said “CHOOSE YOUR WORDS MORE CAREFULLY PLEASE, DOC.” #tcgig

Don’t make worm the first word you say to me in ages “You see that worm burrowing its way though your testicles” That’s what I heard. #tcgig

Two weeks later I got the results. I do have something wrong with me. Embarrassing, but it’s my duty to spread the word of… #tcgig

Varicosa. I have a varicose vein on my testicle. That’s what’s wrong with me. And it means the ache will stay forever #tcgig

Here is the wikipedia link page image…

So I’ve started to use it to make decisions in my day to day life. One ache for coffee, two for tea #tcgig

Like he’s my superhero’s sidekick (Fig 4) #tcgig

“Fig 4″

And that’s my story. I’m starting a charity for varicose vein on balls sufferers – I think we should have a thin purple ribbon as our logo #tcgig

Goodnight twitter, I’ve been @terrysaunders Have fun. #tcgig