I am comedian Kai Humphries. Each autumn I tour throughout the UK with my fellow stand-up and flatmate Daniel Sloss. This year we also roll out the tour to Europe for the first time, visiting 18 major cities over 21 dates. To amuse myself whilst we travel between cities (and whilst Daniel snores) I am keeping a journal of our adventures in the style of a scientific journal where my study subject is Daniel and my role as his support act is merely a disguise to cover up my true objective which is to psycho-analyse his behaviour.
Day: Two
Date: 28 October 2014
Destination: Prague
Subject: Daniel Sloss
Dear Journal,
This morning's hangover is a result of the wine, gin and tequila that we shared with the locals of Vienna amidst some jovial shenanigans in order to stimulate some responses from my test subject, Daniel Sloss. My most prominent discovery in last night's experiment was my subject's stance on the children's documentary Tom and Jerry. Once he was lubricated with alcohol, he shared with our new friends his strong belief that Tom was indeed the innocent victim in the hostile rivalry with his nemesis. Although the vocal majority insisted that Tom was trying to viciously murder Jerry with a multitude of devious and violent schemes, while his rodent rival was just trying to live, Daniel pointed out that Tom was a simple house cat living happily with his owner and harbouring no bad intentions until the antagonistic vermin disrupted the harmony of his dwelling. This opinion resonated with a small number of our party but the rest stood firm that the mouse still didn't deserve to die and that Daniel's opinion that the cat's role in the house was to rid the place of such impostors, was nothing short of archaic. Where else is the mouse supposed to live? Is Daniel suggesting the mouse should live on the street just because it's a mouse, an Orwellian social injustice! Does the mouse really deserve to die when it's only guilty of seeking asylum? My subject's right wing views were received in jest but I will closely monitor such political attitudes over the next three weeks.
13:42
We've been on the train to Prague for almost four hours, we are sharing a coach with two lovely, mature American ladies who Daniel proceeded to charm as though they were a girlfriend's parents. They seemed impressed at first until he fell asleep and then his face melted like someone left the heating on at a really low budget wax work museum where they could only commission the sculptures of celebrities with less than 50k twitter followers, which really undid all of his hard work with the milfs.
17:00
When we arrived at the hotel and found out that we had free wifi, Daniel hurried to his room with some urgency and has been locked in there for almost two hours, I'm scratching my head at what he could be up to, if I am not mistaken I can hear him doing breathing exercises. On a side note; I thought the toilets in Czech Republic were the same as the toilets I encountered yesterday in Austria but it turns out I need to leave the maid an apology note for the mess I made of the bidet.
18:00
Daniel has emerged from his quarters with quite an odd disposition, he appears to be exhausted and dehydrated, and keeps flexing his right palm as though he is carrying a sprain, if I were to make an assumption I'd say he'd been arm wrestling vigorously for the latter half of the afternoon, but strangely enough, I didn't see a challenger enter his room, I must have dozed off.
21:02
I was initially concerned that my thick Geordie accent would prove to be an obstacle in my attempt to masquerade as a comedian in foreign lands but it turns out my accent is exactly that of a Czechoslovakian citizen speaking English as a second language at a GCSE level, they actually think I'm a local so I felt a real sense of community in the reception I just received. My cover is still intact for another day. My subject is on stage now filling the bucket with a hole in it that is his soul, with enough laughter and applause to make him feel some human emotion, I imagine he will be upbeat for at least a short while after this. It is also noteworthy to mention he is holding the microphone with his left hand this evening for some reason.
00:54
This evening my subject got so stoned with members of the audience that when struggling to read out something from his iPhone notes, he stopped to apologise "because he couldn't read his own writing" despite the writing being that of a typed font and not his specific illegible calligraphy. As a side note I must add that talking about marijuana on stage in a Czech public forum will result in selected citizens serving you with a gentleman's doobie après performance. Which is quite bizarre because I spoke largely about masturbation tonight and I am yet to be relieved by any of our supporters.
Alarms are set for a 06:45 pick up tomorrow for our journey to Lithuania, a country I somehow associate with human trafficking and organ theft. I hope I don't wake up in an ice bath with abdominal stitches.
Signing off...