I’ve been doing a bit of research into the five emotional stages of the Edinburgh Festivals experience. Denial, euphoria, rehab, etc. It transpires this doesn’t yet exist as a valid psychiatric model, so I’ll be getting wired into establishing that - and monetising it, you’re right - just as soon as I have filed this column, and perhaps brushed my hair for the first time in August.

I’ll talk you through it in the meantime. Forewarned is forearmed and all that. First comes the incredulity that it’s the summer, yet again - like the shock of the clocks going back and forth; like these yawning nights drawing in and out. August! Already! We’re all surprised. Like we didn’t even notice that old sun rising and falling in the sky.

This is what is widely known as the classic period of delusion - during which one might agree, for example, to attend three million shows in 28 days; to spend all waking and most sleeping hours reeling in theatre, comedy, ballet, music, and the toxic lure of close-up magic; to write a diary about the world’s biggest arts festival for the world’s longest-running national newspaper, because August seems so far away when it’s still the last week in July and you’re answering emails with mild heatstroke in a cocktail bar in rural Croatia.

You might convince yourself that you can watch a Britney Spears drag extravaganza at The Pleasance at 11pm and then bolt it to Waverley Station in 25 seconds. You may come to love certain venues so much - Shedinburgh, the Pianodrome - that you consider making them your official residence.

Arts commentator Nicola Meighan on the chaos and craziness of the Edinburgh festivals

The shows, stars and moments everyone is talking to me about at Edinburgh's festivals

I've had one of my best Edinburgh Fringe experiences and it happened in ladies toilet

You may postulate that you’ve come to embody the titles of myriad Fringe productions: The Upward Journey of a Champagne Bubble; I’m Not A Terrorist - I’m Freddie Mercury; Richard Ashcroft Revived My Libido; Tomatoes Tried To Kill Me But Banjos Saved My Life; My Mum Accidentally Set Me Up With A Married Woman.

Hell, you might even start to believe that if you write a newspaper column about........

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