Wild flowers looking splendid in St Mark's park as I strolled through en route to Newhaven for a breath of sea air.  I had a rather longer expedition to the sea recently.  A friend was up visiting relatives in Burntisland and I nipped over there and joined them on a day out to Elie.  The objective was to find the red quartz stones that Isabel remembered from her youth and which gave one of Elie's beaches its name - ruby beach.

Unsurprisingly we didn't find any but we'd had a pleasant run along the coast of Fife and following our fruitless search a tasty soup and sandwich lunch before wending our way back to Burntisland where we settled into a pub for a while till I caught an early evening train back to Edinburgh.

The main show I'm in, crackers, opened on Monday.  It went very well and we've already had a complimentary review.  My other show, The Curious Case of Osgood Mackenzie, opens next week and we're obviously hoping for a similar reception.

A while ago the Traverse produced a play called Sean and Daro Flake It 'Til They Make It. They've reprised it for the Fringe, perhaps to satisfy the disappointed who missed it.  It's an entertaining comedy about the ups and downs of friendship and quite a lot of people came to see it at 10pm on a Saturday night.

I'd come from a rather more ambitious project in the International Festival round the corner at The Lyceum.  Dusk is a reworking and reimagining of the ideas expressed in the film Dogville by Lars von Trier.  I haven't seen the film but that was no barrier to my enjoyment of this powerful and intriguingly presented production.

Equally intriguing was another EIF show, FOOD.  There's a very extensive desription of it here but I'd advise against reading it till after you've seen the show.  Before seeing it suffice to know that it's something of a riff on man's ascent from sea dwelling blob through hunter gatherer and farmer to where we are now.  There's humour, conjuring and audience participation en route in the first part when the members of the audience seated around a giant dinner table are served by the single actor.  The second part is fascinating and so so cleverly presented but that's all I'll say.  Go see for yourself.

Talking of food, friends and I had a tasty vegetarian meal at Kalpna before going to the show.  I recommend it before any show. 

Much good playwriting dissecting the human condition has come out of Ireland but it's perhaps surprising that when sexual assault is put under the microscope the result is an engaging comedy, albeit dark edged.  That's Lie Low at the Traverse by Ciara Elizabeth Smyth who I was told came from Portobello but is in fact a Dubliner.  I'm sure one fine playwright from Portobello is enough and we already have cmfwood.

The McEwan Hall which is normally home to douce graduation ceremonies reverberated to the noise and energy of a Cuban dance troupe in Havana Street Party.  Beautiful, colourful, demanding choreography faultlessly performed with dynamism and enthusiasm.

Morning concerts at the Queen's Hall are an EIF institution.  The first one this year featured the music of James MacMillan, Charles Ives and Brahms played by a chamber group led by American violinist Stefan Jackiw.  I enjoyed the modernity of MacMillan's Violin Sonata, the quirky eclectic mixture of Ives' Piano Trio and the luscious tones of Brahms Piano Quartet No. 1 with it's exhilarating gypsy style final movement.  In a puff for the concert elsewhere Nicola Benedetti revealed how as a17 year old she had been impressed by Jackiw's ability to produce vibrato with his pinkie, the weakest finger for any violinist.