Funny mummy

I'm not sure this is the best picture of me performing my hilarious Hawaiian hand dance at the Revel Cafe on K-Road in Auckland on Wednesday night, but it is definitely the blurriest (my husband took it).

Also, there seems to be suspicious stains all over my trousers that I can't explain, and I'd only had one vodka, most of which, I'm pretty sure, went into my mouth.

One of my hands, meanwhile, seems to have been swallowed by a painting, and the other lost its fingers. Miraculously, the missing appendages turned up later, so that was alright.

Still, I do look happy and, as we all know, that's the main thing, especially in these challenging times, even if it could be argued I look a little too happy.

It was a comedy gig organised by one of this year's Raw Quest finalists, with a line-up of ten other Raw comedians, most of whom were more successful than I was in this and last year's quests - they could hardly have been less successful - as well as being half my age or less.

Still, my main man, manager and photographer in chief said I was the funniest on the night and as I am largely doing this crazy thing that my friends, if I had any, would call 'brave at my age', for him, that goes a long way to making it worthwhile, with bonus benefits in the bedroom to follow -- even if I was asleep on tranquillisers for those.

I was also the only mother in the place, something I know because part of my set was on the joys of motherhood and at one point I asked 'are there any other mothers in the house?' The silence that ensued was followed by a hearty laugh, which was something at least, even though it stuffed up the joke I was planning to make when the other mothers called out yea! (I'll save that for later).

But as most comedians, young and old, are guys who either ignore or have something slightly condescending if not critical to say about their mothers, I feel that the comedy industry could do with more mothers in its midst, perhaps particularly mothers of boys. Certainly I know that my boys are ecstatic about the prospect of their mother being a stand-up comedian.

And so I will press on with my Hawaiian hands and joys of motherhood jokes in the hope that some day, fairly soon, my skills will be recognised and the national, if not global comedy industry will get the most valuable of all gifts that can be given: perspective. That and life, of course; but I've been there, done that and got the scars to prove it, too.