Jen’s Secret Diary [Public Edition]
18/07/23
I’m sitting in the Soho Theatre bar right now as I write this. Although, if you are reading this now and you think ‘Oh, I should head over there now and kill Jen Ives’ well, I wrote this in the past and have probably left by now. Bad luck, killers!
I really love the Soho Theatre. I was coming to see shows here way before I even started doing comedy myself and the first time I walked in, I knew it was a special place for comedy. I saw Kim Noble’s ‘You Are Not Alone’ which was a big influence on me, as well as lots of other weird crap. I’m not here to do a show today though, I just had a meeting. People in the comedy industry like to meet here because the place radiates comedy (which is the most radioactive substance known to science and kills more people a year than Uranium). I get it though, it’s nice to be near where comedy things are happening. I sometimes come here to write (but not often, ok killers?) because seeing other comics writing at tables near me fuels me to defeat them and steal all their opportunities that they didn’t work for, or deserve.
Ok, now I’m in a Pret. See, I told you I’d have moved on by the time you got your trousers on and your stabbing knife packed away.
I feel like getting older is not being able to tell whether the music they’re playing in Pret is from the current top 50, or if it’s royalty free. Not because it’s ‘bad’ or anything like that, I’ve just genuinely never heard any of it before. It’s kind of like when you go to a Turkish cafe, and they have a TV on from a Turkish satellite channel - and it’s a Turkish music channel, playing the big Turkish hits from that week. No Swift or Sheeran in sight. Just ya boy, Ibrahim Tatlises (I googled that).
You don’t see as many satellite dishes as you used to. I feel like in the late 90’s and 00’s they were all the rage. It felt cool to say that you got special channels beamed down to you from space. These days, what with that dang internet computer, your access to any channel, no matter how obscure or incomprehensible is unrestricted. Hell, even NASA is picking up darn alien signals these days. It’s funny that if we did pick up an ‘alien signal’ we’d automatically assume it was some profound attempt to make contact, when more than likely it’d just be an alien equivalent of Ice Road Truckers.
When I see a satellite on a person’s house now, I think ‘aw that’s quaint - that little house thinks it’s a dang space man’. I patronise that house.
In other alarming news, I made a new video. It’s a new series I’m starting called ‘Let Me Show You’ where I basically just show you something. Pretty novel concept, huh? I bet you wish you’d thought of it? Well, you didn’t. So keep your gloopy alien hands off it.
You can watch the first episode HERE
Thanks for reading my stupid diary. If you’d like to support or follow me in other places, it’s all here baby: https://linktr.ee/jenives
It’s all for you, Damien.