Sat, May 5th - 4:59PM

I never thought I would ever write those words down in a blog but here I am. Let me take you back a bit, when I was growing up in Glasgow in the 70s and my dad let me hear an LP vinyl recording of Glasgow comic Billy Connolly- I have been hooked and love the man ever since. His story telling style hooked me and made me really interested in comedy.

When I went into comedy at the age of 35, the first press reaction was “Janey Godley is like discovering an early Billy Connolly” I was touched but a tad embarrassed in case the great man ever read that and was annoyed, as if he ever read about me? What a dick I am.

Anyway I have followed his career and been totally in love with his style and always regarded him as the best comic I have ever known. So I land in Wellington New Zealand for the Comedy festival to learn that the Big Man is in town and was staying in the same hotel as me and Ashley. To make matters worse, the hotel slip under every door every day a note about the weather and about comedy shows at the festival, so they slipped under his door “come see Janey Godley at the International Comedy festival and see why the press call her the female Billy Connolly” I was was horrified to know this! He would read that shit!

I had small dreamy moments, we would meet in the lobby and by some miracle we would be pals for life meeting up again!

I certainly had to stem the overwhelming desire to stalk every corridor and hunt him down, so I eventually gave the reception a copy of my autobiography ‘Handstands in the Dark’ with a short note to be sent to his room. The fact he may ever read my book would have been enough for me, I am not joking- it was that or I started hacking into the reception computer to find his room.

So, there was me and Ashley sitting having a cup of tea in the most beautiful hotel room we have ever been in and my phone rang.

“Hello Billy Connolly here” the Scottish voice boomed out.

“Get fucked you cunts, who is this? Is that you Terry Alderton?” I said believing it to be amazing UK comic who is at the comedy festival with us. 

“Nope, it’s me Billy, you want to meet in the lobby for a cup of tea?” he suggested, I squeaked a yes.

I ran about the room, pulling off my pyjamas and managed to pull a bra on outside in, run a brush through my mental hair, grab my bag and me and Ashley went racing down to the lifts.

“Mum for fucksake calm down, you look like Kathy Bates from Misery, he will be terrified you are going to hobble him” Ashley yelled as I managed to press all the lift buttons but the ground floor one.

Eventually after what felt like 45 minutes the lift reached ground floor and I spotted myself in the mirror and I indeed looked like a woman who had ran away from a hostage situation. I breathed slowly and walked calmly into the foyer. Billy Connolly came towards me dressed sharp and looking good and hugged me close “lets get tea” he said.

After introductions, Ashley got us a tea tray, said hello and the excused herself and explained she was going to see The Avengers and bid her goodbyes.

Me and Billy Connolly chatted for over an hour and I tried hard not to gabble and talk utter shite and managed to calm down, he has a way of making you calm and is a genuinely lovely man.

I met my hero and I totally fell in love with him, he is really attractive and warm to meet.

We laughed, we talked comedy, we talked art, we talked books, we talked Glasgow and then he said “I will come see your show tonight” I said “please don’t it would be like singing karaoke in front of Elvis” he laughed and said “I am a great audience member I laugh and I love comedy”

I didn’t believe he would come, not that I think he is a liar, I just thought he was being polite – so me and Ashley headed up to the San Fran Bath House venue in Cuba street. We explained to the ticket man that Billy Connolly might turn up and it felt like we were fantasists who regularly claim famous people are our pals! The man nodded and rolled his eyes!

The venue manager Ziggy was over the moon though and the staff were excited about the prospect of our lovely venue having such a star in....then I felt bad if he didn’t turn up, the prospect of sharing the room with me for an hour would disappoint them.

Billy Connolly came to the door and Ashley met him and walked him up. The venue was closed to the public and the staff were so overwhelmed yet cool as hell and made the big man and me a cup of tea.

The look on my punters faces as they rocked up to the bar to buy drinks and turned round to see Billy Connolly just tickled me pink. Ashley and Billy sat down shared pizza and the show started.

I was very aware as i walked out onto that stage that everyone one in that room knew Billy Connolly was sitting there watching me, I was aware he was sitting there....my long time comedy hero was sitting beside my daughter with hands clasped and staring at the stage. My heart skipped a beat, the light blinded me and i said “Hello Wellington, how are you?” and the cheer went up.

I did the show, I did my stuff, I riffed, I chatted to the crowd, I made good laughs and claps happen and I forgot he was there, I forgot Billy Connolly was sitting watching until I heard his big laugh and then my heart boomed again and the show went on....the show went great...there were some odd heckles which I embraced and which made the show better and soon the lights dimmed and I was standing in front of my comedy hero.

He put his two big arms around me, hugged me close and said “that was brilliant, you are so unafraid up there, you know the craft so well, there is no such thing as female or male comedy, there is just comedy and you are comedy Janey, the way you calmy held them in your hand and took them on a journey, everything was just amazing, well done” It was the best endorsement ever.

My heart swelled with pride and relief, I know even if I died he would have said nice things, but it was a good show and as a seasoned one woman show performer of over ten years I know the difference...it was a good ‘un. Thank GOD!

We went onto the balcony and he lit a cigar and then quoted all the bits he loved and replayed how they made him laugh and then I forgot he was a huge star and me, him and Ashley nattered for over an hour and then we walked back.

Here’s the thing, I thought Billy Connolly watching me do comedy was scary, no- walking through the busy roads of Wellington with Billy Connolly was terrifying – he doesn’t give a fuck about the GREEN MAN and he marches onto busy roads.

Ashley felt compelled to walk beside him and I ran like a wee hobbit behind them and visualised my daughter being battered by a car alongside Billy Connolly!

Him and Ashley were like big Highlanders tramping through the glens of heather, no sideways glances just big Scottish arms swinging and weirdly cars stopped as if in homage to their presence....me? they almost hit me and were annoyed I was in their way!

I can’t tell you how good a night I had and thanks Billy for coming and thanks to Ziggy and the crew at San Fran bathhouse in Wellington. You rock.

Thu, Apr 5th - 11:27AM

Am not really, that was a poke at the recent article (one amongst many) by self promoter Samantha Brick who wrote a column in  UK rag The Daily Mail (I know how mad?) about how stunningly beautiful she is and how women hate her for it. She tells of pilots on planes, ordering her champagne, bar men who refuse her credit card and random men buying train tickets to unwanted destinations just to be in her orbit, I think she overdosed on Mills and Boons books as an impressionable girl. By the way her husband looks like he is in a re- enactment of a crime scene standing beside her near the woods in the photo in the Daily Mail. I wonder what he makes of her madness.

I genuinely know a few stunningly heart stopping gorgeous women and I know they would never ‘claim’ beauty and then use their aesthetic luck against other women, coz they are not deluded or mentally unstable. Beauty really is what others see not what you recognise as a talent/burden on your own skin. My husband regularly tells me I am beautiful because he married me 32 years ago and if he keeps telling himself this, he will feel he hasn’t fucked up his original opinion because he as Aspergers syndrome and hates being wrong.

I believe my daughter Ashley is beautiful and I am her mum and will always look at her with awe, because that narcissism is based on what my own cells and vagina made 25 years ago, but she is beautiful to me and thats a mother’s love right there! But she is still beautiful.

Poor Samantha Brick got a torrent of abuse on twitter after her article went viral, but this isn’t the first time she has peddled this deluded bollocks- she has written about this before for other publications. So she must believe it.

Women really can be their own worst enemy, we buy heaps of magazines that show up any fat bits or bad skin on the celebs they beg us to worship and my point is men don’t do that? I had a pub for 15yrs and not once did I hear a man say “she hasn’t blended her make up in and her shoes don’t match” other women speak like that and Samantha Brick’s article makes this situation worse.

Makes you wonder what women like her really think? So Samantha believes-‘ I am stunning to look at it’ - therefore every career issue I have had is down to other women sabotaging my job? No, Samantha I suspect you being an average looking woman who keeps blaming other women for your own failures mean you have psychological issues that need attending.

Life has been tough past few weeks; I went to Boston comedy festival and had such fun. It’s a great city and the women I met there were just cracking funny people to get to know. The downside of Boston was- I contracted some stinky chest virus and coughed my way through the tour and landed in Glasgow so I could immediately head to Newcastle at The Stand comedy club. I cannot tell you how amazing The Stand comedy club is, they really looked after me and so I headed home to Glasgow sick a wheezing pig right into The Glasgow Comedy festival where I had a double bill one woman show to accommodate the volume of tickets sold.

Thankfully Ashley was there and she show managed, introduced and directed my material as my head was too woolly, and lo and behold I got a stonking review despite being so yucky. The audience really did give up so much energy I think I managed to do the shows without looking like a sick martyred comedian- so THANKS GLASGOW!

You can see the review here: Chortle  and the clip of my Boston show here: YouTube

Tue, Mar 27th - 2:04PM

Firstly it’s pretty small and I mean really small and secondly it is located in just a few venues in the Cambridge Area of Boston near the famous Harvard University. I suppose I was unprepared to just be doing odd slots of 7 to 14 minutes but I did get to attend and take part in their workshops and comedy panels. My favourite part was getting to meet loads of American women comics from all over the US and share our experiences, normally that is done in busy bars as comics come off a show and scream at each other over loud music and warm beer. This way was much nicer, also getting to see a variant of comedic styles, sketches, musical and dance comedy really made the festival an experience for me.

Women comics in one venue in a line up usually eye each other up like wary cats in an alley, or maybe am just used to dealing with lots of egos back stage in comedy gigs, but here the women were very supportive of each other. The organisers of the festival tried their best to include me in lots of the events and were generally well co ordinate and made sure I knew exactly where and when I should be. The upside is Boston is an amazing backdrop to a comedy festival, the city is just breathtakingly lovely and the people were so sweet and chatty.

We stayed in a stunning brownstone apartment/hotel which was so stocked with antiques and original fittings, I felt like I had broken into a museum, who gets to put their knickers in an armoire? I can’t describe how beautiful the place looked.

The downside was after the hot weather slid off to be replaced with a cold front we got mice running the floor and that made comedy seem that much more comedic and scary for me and my pal Shirley who came with me. The enduring memory of a mouse stuck to a sticky trap screaming for death at 5am will stay with me forever, but the hotel did discount us and were profusely apologetic. I have to say the place was stunning and very clean, it’s just old houses will get mice...I wish they had added to the charm and gave us a cat with the room. Then again a cat ripping mice apart might not be a nice memory either.

Luckily my daughter Ashley wasn’t with me on this tour as she would have rescued the mouse knitted it mittens and called it William Shatner.

I can’t say anything bad about this apartment it was just so welcoming, but am hoping when I head down to NZ in mid April for their comedy festival I don’t have to deal with mice.

Boston women in comedy festival will grow and develop nicely and I hope to make a return.

Fri, Mar 2nd - 7:07AM

I stood in that small room that was painted a dirty mushroom colour; it had one shelf bed with a blue foam plastic mattress. The mattress when pressed emanated a new smell to the collage of stinks already in the room. I grabbed the grey crusty blanket and lay down. Then immediately sat up- how the fuck did I imagine I could lie down in this room and sleep like I was in some unusual hotel...I was in a police cell and I didn’t know when I was getting out.

I looked about and wondered how many people had slept there and if they had all managed a full piss into the mattress. I imagined men standing up and just pissing onto the bed with no care who may have to come after them. My fingers touched the rough blanket and I felt as though microscopic bugs were jumping onto my hand. I flinched and stared at the ceiling.

The looming sense of aloneness and my mild to middling claustrophobia made a sudden panic flutter in my chest as if a small, half dead bird was trapped inside my ribcage. I could feel my heart bang in my ears and my blood rushing through my veins, my gums tightened and my tongue tingled with the fear rising inside me. I almost screamed, but held back the panic as I knew my husband was in a cell near me and I didn’t want him worried about me.

“Excuse me, can I get a toothbrush in here” I shouted as I banged on the door. Eventually someone who genuinely looked like Les Dawson dressed as a woman came in through the door. I was surprised she wasn’t a police woman, why wasn’t she a police person?

 “A toothbrush? Where the fuck do you think you are? The Hilton?” she shouted, turned and slammed the door shut, I guessed she must have been some sort of police worker or someone who looks after female remand prisoners and I started giggling nervously as I recalled she really did look like a wee fat aproned woman from a 70s sitcom. Am sure she had a moustache and then I pondered what if she was a policeman who likes to dress as a wee fat woman at nights and I had disturbed him/her? Then I thought...maybe I should be worrying about this situation instead of finding something to giggle about. I was in a police cell for possessing guns and that was fact I had to face.

Yet weirdly all I could think about was “I really want to brush my teeth”.

I knew that my daughter Ashley was ok; I knew she was with family and I knew my husband was in a nearby cell as he was arrested with me. How could he not know his dead father had secreted weapons in his house the house we were living in whilst my own flat was being renovated. How could he not know this? I was so angry, and had to face it; of course he knew but didn’t bother to worry about it.

Circumstances and a woman scorned had lead me to that police cell, if my father in law hadn’t fucked some crazy bitch who after a long turbulent relationship with the family hadn’t showed the police a map of the back garden where she believed the guns to be.....I would be ok. But we weren’t ok. They found the guns.

In that cell for that whole night I still recall the feeling of horrible injustice. Those policemen knew those guns weren’t mine- yet they still locked me up overnight.

I lay awake on the smelly mattress with the scabby blanket and vowed to never take my liberty for granted ever again- after a sleepless night I was taken to the courts in Glasgow and released without charge. It was over.

It’s been years since all that happened and I have spoke about it in my comedy show and made funny jokes and stories surrounding the whole situation, yet it still haunts me.

The upshot of that experience back in 1994 is- I joined Amnesty International in an effort to help anyone who was dragged into a situation through others and innocently ended up in a cell.

I know I was guilty by association to the family, and my innocence wasn’t clear cut but many people are held against their will and don’t have proper representation or help so please join @amnestyuk on twitter and get involved with their projects.

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Thu, Feb 23rd - 10:31AM

Let me take you back to the 60s when I was a kid and my mammy had to feed her, dad and four kids on a low income. People talk about how poor I was back then when they have read my book Handstand in the Dark, which charts my childhood in the East End of Glasgow, and it was tough- no denying.

Seven days a week, we ate a full plate of potatoes, cabbage, carrots and a tiny bit of meat (which was more expensive) and our puddings were fruit or tinned custard and bananas. We regularly dined on fish, fried lightly in porridge oats or cheap cuts of liver braised in onions with big potatoes and pots of tripe with milky sauce or plates of chunky cheap homemade soup. We ate leeks, mushrooms, turnip and a whole range of whatever vegetables were in season and didn’t really know any different. Sweets and eating between meals wasn’t possible as we didn’t have the money for that kind of luxury.

Back then kids didn’t have food allergies, and I didn’t know anyone who refused to eat greens!

I have just realised that how we ate is now the diet of the middle classes, the very diet we moaned about and vowed to change the minute we were old enough to earn our own money and buy our own food. We ached for deep fried fish and chips, which was a very expensive treat, usually only allowed if someone had died and there was no time to cook! It was pure emergency food NEVER every day consumed convenience food as it is now.

I recently discussed this with the US documentary maker Morgan Spurlock (he of Supersize Me film) who was really interested to hear this as he is making another food based documentary. It seems the poverty diet of the 60s was so healthy and yet we kids couldn’t wait to escape it!

Who here who reached young adult hood in the late 70s immediately started gobbling down Indian take aways and fried crispy pancakes with their own hard earned wages? Anything to escape the dire situation of ‘potted heid’ (cheap meat cuts in jelly) and horrible plates of corned beef and mash! I know I did- and that’s when I started gaining the weight that I would fight for the rest of my life to lose.

I didn’t know then that cheap cuts of meat braised with seasonal vegetables was the best diet in the world for me.

It stuns me when I meet people whose kids won’t eat a vegetable or even try fresh fish- Ashley my daughter has always had a great varied range of fish and vegetables in her diet and is also amazed when friends of hers have never eaten asparagus or savoy cabbage!

There has been medical evidence that kids today eat way too much white pasta as parents know kids love something basically tasteless and squishy will go down well, yet too much white pasta isn’t good for the colon and has links to bowel cancer as lack of fibre is something we all know about. White pasta has no fibre, we can swap it occasionally for potato skins or brown wholemeal pasta!

Unfortunately the previous generation of men and women who passed down hearty food recipes, like homemade soup and liver and onion casseroles are no longer with us or have gave up trying- and we now have millions of children who have never tasted oatcakes or lentil soup or turnip mash and broad beans and thats a shame.

I do understand that for the poorer people in our society that it’s cheaper to buy a big bag of frozen burgers and sausage rolls from Iceland than to start chopping and peeling turnip or getting a pot of soup full of split peas and barley on the go, as some of them have never tasted it, so why should they cook it?  Yet it is actually cheaper to eat vegetables than frozen convenience food, it just takes a bit of know how.

I wish that the older people in our community’s could get together with the younger generation at community halls and have cooking lessons and share the knowledge of people who knew how to cook good healthy food on a tight budget.

I know it’s a utopian idea but if pensioner Mary Berry can get the UK baking again with her TV show surely and older person on TV can get generations of people learning how to use pulses and cheap cuts of meat? We need to teach kids today that a meal doesn’t come in a box and maybe bring the heart disease and obese levels down?

I am now back to my old diet of bits of meat, fish, heaps of vegetables and no sweet treats or eating between meals and am losing weight and feeling good. Who knew my poverty diet was the one thing that would crack my overweight issues?

If you have any diet, help and advice or like me pretending to be a life coach occasionally follow me on Twitter @janeygodley

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