Tonight, the Melbourne International Comedy Festival begins. 

What this means is:

The streets are made of paper. There are flyers and posters plastered across every surface from Brunswick to South Melbourne. You can tell what month it is in Melbourne by what colour the walls of The Vegie Bar are. If you see muted blues, dark reds, purples and blacks in your peripheral vision, it's Arts Festival time. Bright colours? The Comedy festival is upon us. If there's a big heap of pastel and everything is bordered by a vine, there's a music festival on somewhere a couple of hours out of town.

'Convenience stores' in Swanston Street are about to become restaurants. You know those festering hot dogs and sausage rolls teenagers eat as a dare in exchange for a hundred bucks? Comedians eat those. Deliberately. For dinner. As the healthy option. It's that or a Mars Bar.

Evenings are about to get dark earlier. It happens over the course of the festival. At the start, you can't believe shows start as early as six. It's still light at six! By the end, time has taken on a new dimension and you start thinking things like WOW, TIME IS AMAZING. WHY ISN'T THERE AN EXPRESSION IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE FOR THE FEELING OF TIME PASSING QUICKLY AND ALSO SLOWLY? MAYBE I WILL WRITE A THESIS ABOUT IT! YEAH! A THESIS! (Did I mention sleep deprivation has an effect on mental processing?) 

The other thing? From a hardened cynic like myself? The other thing is: it's so exciting. Walking through the autumnal streets - that little bit chilly but with the sun on your face - you don't know what you're walking towards. Good comedy is so fun to watch. Great comedy transforms you. Discovering good or great comedy before everyone else does? Delicious.

I'm hoping for some delicious.

Aren't we all?