21 h. ago The 22 best Edinburgh bars to enjoy during the Festivals according to bartenders

We’ve asked some drinks experts to share their favourite places in Edinburgh to enjoy a drink or two during the Festivals.

Politics

27 h. ago Thousands of tabletop gamers return to the Royal Highland Centre this September

Tabletop Scotland is one of the UK’s premier festivals of analogue gaming, allowing visitors to unplug from technology and enjoy the best in board games, card games and roleplaying games. With over 130 different exhibitors, gamers will be spoilt for choice when exploring the tabletop hobby at the Highland Hall, Royal Highland Centre, over three days on the 5th, 6th, and 7th of September.

Politics

3 d. ago Up, up and away! Skies above Bristol fill with dinosaurs, aliens and cows for annual balloon festival

Hundreds of dedicated early risers were up at dawn on Sunday morning to enjoy Bristol's annual balloon festival - as the skies were filled with dinosaurs, aliens and cows over the weekend.

Politics

3 d. ago Horror incident sees metal barrier swing into side of Edinburgh bus during high winds

It has not been confirmed whether anybody was injured.

Events

4 d. ago Lily Phillips: Crying review – laughing through the toxic positivity around childbirth

Monkey Barrel, EdinburghAmusing vignettes about arrogant consultants and undignified poos keep things light as Phillips documents a harrowing hospital experienceExpectations and reality don’t always align when it comes to childbirth. Lily Phillips (not that one, she assures us, getting good mileage from her porn star namesake) thought she was well informed. She’d gone through a long process of IVF to get there, attended NCT classes, and, when labour started, she was ready for the if not serene then empowering birthing experience and magical moment of immediate love that would follow.Instead, she discovered that “birth is barbaric and early motherhood is brutal”. Yet even her NCT WhatsApp group, where she turned after a harrowing hospital experience, requested “no negative birth stories, please”. Crying does a lot to redress the balance and cuts through the “toxic positivity” surrounding childbirth that left Phillips feeling alone. Continue reading...

Events

6 d. ago I feel they’re watching me – Pride of Wren aged 100 as she visits old barracks

Dorothea Barron laid the first brick as her old barracks near Edinburgh which is being transformed into housing.

Politics

7 d. ago Edinburgh bar unveils Oasis ‘Supernova’ makeover ahead of Murrayfield shows

Fans named Noel or Liam can enjoy a free pint.

Politics

8 d. ago 'The arts have to be for more than just the wealthy and well connected' comedian Holly Spillar on working artists barriers to the Fringe

With costs continually on the rise and little financial support to hand, low-income background artists increasingly can't afford to come to the Fringe. Comedian Holly Spillar speaks for and to the comics priced out of this year's festival

Economics

1 week ago Desiree Burch: The Golden Wrath review – uproarious tales of a midlife cataclysm

Monkey Barrel, EdinburghThe charismatic standup rails against middle age with inventive and sometimes lurid material about the perimenopauseDesiree Burch is 46. For most comedians, this is the time to deliver your mildly grumpy show about middle age: the bodily decay; the annoying habits of the generation coming up behind you. That all features in The Golden Wrath, but it’s ratcheted up to the nth degree. For Burch, middle age isn’t a mild development, it’s a cataclysm. The perimenopause apparently has 66 separate symptoms, and Burch’s mind and body are weathering not a slow decline but an all-out attack. All-out attack is Burch’s performance style too, in a show that hurls at us her experience of hormonal female midlife.It’s a blast – because our host is a charismatic, bombastic stage presence, and because she textures the comedy of ageing with moral indignation alongside the physical indignity. Burch sets the scene by placing herself generationally, holding up her own gen X experi...

Politics