I was a bit disappointed by Pina the other day. Some of the dancing was certainly impressive and I gasped at one dancer's leap and nosedive but thank goodness it was in 3D. It would have been a bit flat otherwise.

Nor did I learn much about Pina herself. She seems to have been a lady of few words. One dancer said that Pina's only comment about her performance in 20 years was "you must search harder". She didn't even say what the poor girl should be searching for.

Memory of Water on the other hand, in which two of my chums were appearing, was terrific. The script was very strong, the production was first-rate and the performances, especially Caroline's were super. If you think jokes about death are in bad taste maybe you won't enjoy it but the tango swaying pall bearers could be the thing to change your mind.

It's a profit sharing venture of course like so much work by small theatre groups. They are getting great houses, albeit limited to about 50 by the space they are playing in so if there is a profit at the end of the week it won't be anywhere near what they deserve.

Fingers crossed the saga has ended.

Looks like this broadband is settling down to be a saga. After running ok since the miraculous resurrection yesterday it collapsed at some time late this morning and has been poorly, not to say comatose ever since.

It seemed this morning that I had praised BT too soon for when I switched on about 10.30 to check my email there was no broadband.

The phone was ok so I set to to complain. After various button presses I found my self off-shore and explained my problem and its background. We then went through various restarts and examination of sockets and filters, all of which I had either already done or felt pointless but he would not be gainsaid. Then a line test. I had to swear that during the ensuing 15 to 20 minutes I would not make a phone call or answer one until he called to say he had completed the test. A bit of a problem to know which call to answer you might think but I helpfully suggested he call my mobile when the job was done.

So he did, only to explain that the end of his resources had been reached and that for further help and ultimate satisfaction he would have to pass me on to another department. He explained this to me several times and assured me several times that he would explain my problem very carefully to his colleague. We parted with mutual declarations of esteem.

His colleague came on the line saying I understand your problem is X. Wincing a little I said that it was in fact Y and delivered the entire back story. This chap seemed to be but a facilitator for his contribution was to tell me that he would advise engineers who would rush to my assistance no later than next Wednesday while he "took ownership of the problem". There was it seemed a fault. No kidding. He thanked me for my patience. Mutual esteem being the order of the day I assured him of my delight and rang off.

I kid you not, within 10 seconds the previously missing broadband light flickered briefly orange and settled to a healthy steady blue which it has maintained ever since. So aren't BT marvellous or what?

Telephone and broadband service restored in less than 24 hours. Well done BT.

I've just spent four sunny days on location at an Edinburgh bowls club with a group of very well organised ECA film students. The shoot finished bang on schedule and we then played bowls for an hour under the expert guidance of a champion. The director (he with a knee missing from his jeans and the tea-cosy on his head) is hooked and left swearing to take out membership and bring the club's average age down a decade or three.

My broadband was out of action when I got home and investigation revealed a cock-up by either BT, Talk Talk or both. My number has been given to someone in another flat in the block. Currently the phone rings in both flats but neither of us has broadband on the line. Thanks to a long ago flirtation with FON I have an alternative, albeit open to all comers.

So till it's sorted out, and with a holiday weekend almost upon us who knows when that will be, I am having unprotected web access. It calls to mind when STD meant subscriber trunk dialling.

I spotted a number 12 bus the other day whose destination board declared that it was going to Seafield and serving the Eastern General Hospital. Since the Eastern closed in 2007 and the bus was heading in the opposite direction my immediate reaction was to damn Lothian Buses for incompetence. Then I remembered that the Science Festival was in town and realised that it must have been a demonstration of the strange nature of space and time.

The two talks I've been to so far, Science, Sex and Theatre; A Potent Brew and The Science of Wine and Cocktails, dealt entertainingly with some of my interests and I've another one in view about music. I shall have to try some of the novels and plays of Carl Djerassi who gave the first talk. He's credited, inter alia, with being the main man behind the oral contraceptive but he's also a writer of what he calls "science in fiction" , which he characterises as being about real, proven, imminent or at the very least plausible science as opposed to science fiction. He didn't seem the sort of chap who would write in too worthy a manner, except I suppose in a scientific paper, but I shan't rush out and buy them all at once just in case.

Rona Munro is a playwright whose work is not in the least worthy in tone and whose latest play, Pandas, is given a sparkling production at the Traverse. It is a cleverly constructed tale in which the lives and loves of six characters are linked to great comedic effect. The play is well served by a simple, attractive and cunningly designed set, great sound and lighting, and the cast act their little socks off.

Much the same could be said of Edinburgh Theatre Arts production of A Fistful of Mondays in which a cast that included a number of my friends and acquaintances gave a packed house an evening full of laughter, with the occasional pause for tears, culminating in a splendid line dancing number.

Given the respective resources of the two companies you couldn't put a fag paper between the results of their work.

I found myself sipping non-alcoholic beer and discussing football in the Blue Blazer around 10 this morning after responding to an emergency call for an actor. To make sure my little scene has a chance to reach the big screen answer this appeal.

This photo is for Andrew as are these.

In this post I regretted the demise of Jazz FM as a national broadcaster. Well eighteen months later it has ventured out of its metropolitan heartland into the airwaves above Edinburgh once again. I have my three DAB sets tuned in and I wish it every success. Pity about the ads though.

No ads at the Camino café last night where I betook myself for an hour or so to hear a fellow thespian's debut performance as a singer. She was very impressive although I thought her KT Tunstall numbers didn't suit her voice as well as the other songs she sang. There was a sweet young man on the bill as well who disarmingly apologised profusely for forgetting the lyrics of one number. Someone should whisper in his ear to just doo la la the next time.

I wandered home down Leith Walk around 10 find Edinburgh's bon viveurs still sitting out at café tables profiting from April's unusual weather. But were those hedonists not heedless of the law? Don't we have some daft rule that insists such tables should be swept away by 9pm?

I got home in time to see Rory McIlroy take a leaf out of my golfing book, poor lad.

I managed to avoid spending any money at the Scottish Golf Show on Friday, no thanks to the dozens of exhibitors eager to do me the deal of the decade, and after a pleasant lunch accompanied by even more pleasant conversation window shopped and basked in the sun for a bit before getting home in time for the RSNO.

It's not often that I go to a concert and thoroughly enjoy every piece played but this was an exception. I had gone primarily to hear Beethoven's 4th piano concerto which has been one of my desert island discs since I heard it in the Festival Hall when I was a student visiting London in search of gainful employment. I don't remember who played it then or even the name of the orchestra but those opening piano notes and the orchestra's reply instantly evoke the sense of warm wonder that flooded through me on that first hearing.

The programme included a charming Haydn symphony and works by Kodaly. His Hary Janos Suite, originating as music for a comic opera, used a huge band with the esoteric (to us if not to the Hungarians) cimbalom, several lusty trombones, other booming brass and a satisfyingly large percussion section. For the most part it's loud, tuneful and jolly; all characteristics that make for happy listening. For the orchestra it called for vigorous playing and even athleticism from one of the marimba players who had to dive sideways at one point to still the reverberations of a set of tubular bells.

The audience went home most cheerfully.

I had to consult some records this evening and learnt to my astonishment that I have been at this address for five years.

I've profited from the Cameo's enlightened pricing regime to visit the cinema on two afternoons this week. Submarine was an entertaining account of adolescent angst with a few original touches that was well worth seeing, but Essential Killing was the sort of killingly inessential viewing that appeals to only a select few.

One of last summer's activities enters the public arena.

It's not only phones that are dumb.
The bins in the left and right stores were emptied less than 24 hours before this picture was taken. There is a reason (not a very good one) why the binmen didn't empty the middle one, but that's rather beside the point.

Imagine the scene. A member of homo sapiens sapiens leaves his flat with a bag of rubbish. He approaches the bin stores and ponders "which bin will I but my bag in?".

He ponders anew "I can surely sqeeze it into that middle one" and opens the gate. Then discovers "Oh, I can't get my bag in. There's no room. I'll just put it down where the vermin can get at it."

And finally, no doubt having been born in a field as all good parents used to say, he shambles off leaving the gate open.

I bought a new phone recently. I don't know if it advertises itself as a smart phone (it was probably too cheap for that) but given the dumbness it has just exhibited there is no way it could avoid prosecution if it did.

It has lots of nice features, like a radio and a music player. It also has a diary function and I've been using that in an attempt to wean myself from a paper diary. I've entered numerous engagements up to late September this year.

This weekend I had lots of timepieces to move an hour forward but not my computer and not my new phone. They smartly moved themselves ahead.

But the phone also dumbly moved every future entry in my diary one hour ahead. That is not dumb it is just plain stupid.

We were filming in a care home this weekend. It was a nice, relaxed and friendly place so I mused on putting my name down for it while I was there. But I didn't. It's much too soon.

Seeing a picture on the wall of Sean Connery visiting the place I thought he must have been sussing out a spot for himself. He is after all a good bit older than me and he'd surely love to be back in the old country away from the stress of Carribean living for his final years.

But it was only a sentimental tour through the scenes of his youth for the care home stands on the site of North Merchiston Primary School, his alma mater.

Who should sit down next to me at the Traverse this evening but the census man. The show was called Smalltown. How appropriate is that?

I was being hurled about Dumbiedykes in a wheelchair at lunchtime yesterday but thanks to the iplayer caught up with the Movie Café this morning. There was even less of the band playing than I had anticipated but we did survive Liz Taylor's death and learn about the Rank gong.

It was found in a junk shop in Greenwich yonks ago and some years later given as a wedding present to the couple who run the Dunedin Wind Band. Not a terribly exciting story but illustrative of how things turn up in the least expected way. Just as on Wednesday night the man who turned up at my door with a census form was a theatre friend I hadn't seen for four or five years, earning an honest crust while hawking himself around the drama school audition circuit. He's living a few streets away from me in the same street that was lived in by another young actor who played in a production of mine a couple of years ago. Unlikely to be the same flat but how spooky would that be if it is.

The first day of shooting "Similar Lily" went well today and as a plus it introduced me to a lovely little park that I didn't know existed just off the Pleasance. I'd have uploaded a photo had it not been for the fact that dressing the set involved spreading litter all over the place.

The big movie news of the day was Liz Taylor's death. I'm not especially sad but may be crying about it soon. I've been eagerly awaiting the Dunedin Wind Band item due to be broadcast on BBC Scotland's Movie Café tomorrow but have been warned that it may be bumped in favour of an obit for the dear departed.