Home from home

It feels like I have moved house into the Pleasance. I've certainly spent more of the weekend there than I have at my own flat. I should add that the exhaustion of frantic Fringe binging is made even worse by the Olympics. Between shows you race to the nearest big screen to see the next big race. Meanwhile with iPhone in hand you're also catching up on what you have missed while you've been elsewhere.

Here's a list of the shows that I have seen over the past couple of days. They are in order of recommendation. If you're reading this and in Edinburgh, or plan to be here over the Fringe, I hope that these might be helpful.

Outstanding

1. The Pin: It's quite a while since I have come out of a show open-mouthed at its brilliance. This is really worth seeing. It's quite hard to describe, but the simple explanation is "outstanding comedy sketch show".

Highly recommended

2. Ian D Montfort : Hysterical fake fake psychic with magic powers.

3. The Scottish Falsetto Sock Puppet Theatre: I've loved these wee tykes for years. Yes, they are socks. Yes, they sing in falsetto. Yes, they have a theatre.

4. The Showstoppers: Think live, on stage, musical created with the help of the audience almost in the style of the movie question in the board game Balderdash. The night we were there the plot focused on the Playboy Mansion. I was very proud that my title for the musical was adopted unchallenged by anyone else in the audience, and won immediate approval from the director on stage. In a moment of brilliance I came up with Bunny tails.

5. Mervyn Stutter's Pick of the Fringe: You can't really go wrong with this show where seven acts come and offer samples of their work. On the back of this we're going to risk bankruptcy buy some extra tickets.

Well worth seeing

6. The boy with tape on his face: This show is based on mime, props, music, and an awful lot of very willing audience participation. If you have kids to take out, or visitors with a poor command of English, this would be ideal for them given that the humour is so visual.

7=. My life as told by the Smiths: Beautiful one man show based around a love story, and illustrated by Smiths songs. It's a stage show rather like Coupland's Girlfriend in a coma, where the links to the Smiths are a little more obvious.

7=. The half: Pick something by Guy Masterton at the Fringe and you won't be disappointed. This is another brilliant one-man performance, with a good smattering of Shakespeare providing a background as an actor self-destructs.

9. Shakespeare for breakfast: It's almost obligatory to see this show as part of any Fringe Binge. This year it's up to its usual standards of silliness.

OK

10. Hell's bells: This is a neat little play by Lynne Truss. We bought tickets on the back of excellent sales technique by a girl with flyers, and got in on a two-for-one deal. It was worth what we paid.

Don't bother

11. Kieran and Joe - Friends of steel: Too forced and not very funny.