untold blisses

Last year, I saw Sara Pascoe at the Greenwich comedy festival and said that “I definitely want to see in her own show”.  As it happens, tickets to her Animal tour went on sale shortly after the festival, and I snapped up a pair for the first night of the tour at the West End Centre in Aldershot (where we’d seen Paul Foot a couple of years ago).  

In the time between the festival and now, I have fallen for her a little more.  She became a patron of the British Humanist Association which is always a good sign and made me inordinately happy.  She published her first book which I devoured, photographing paragraphs of it and sending it to Husband annotated with lots of “THIS IS ME!!!!” comments.  The book wasn’t quite what I expected which made me love Sara even more – instead of a standard autobiography, she had interwoven her own anecdotes with science, society, and psychology with a feminist edge.  It was incredibly engaging.

With her book fresh in my mind, I was a little worried that her stand-up would go over that content but it was a mixture.  Actually, it if had have been a repeat of the book, I would still have loved it as she is so genuinely funny.  She talked about her relationships, living in south east London, and about trying to be a nice person.

There were so many things that I recognised in myself that I was constantly nudging Husband – the equivalent of sending him photos of her book.  Her hatred of selfies (“the narcissism of being in a photo and only trusting yourself to take it”) and Jason Donovan being her first love aged 8 being two of the things which I identified with.

After the gig, she very kindly signed books – this is yet another reason why I hate myself for being a Kindle reader as I couldn’t ask her to sign that, so I had to buy a second copy of the book.  We chatted about being the same age – she very kindly said she thought I look younger that her, which I am by three months and we agreed that those extra three months gave her such worldly experience that she was able to patronise me a little.  And I was able to tell her how much of her book resonated with me.  Husband told me afterwards that I came across a little dorky, but I don’t care because I LOVE HER.

She ended her set by telling us that she wants to be Prime Minister, and with the words “Everything’s going to be ok, thanks to Prime Minister Sara Pascoe”.  She has my vote.