Tim Cornwell: Fomo at the Mouth |

It's Fear Of Missing Out. FOMO is broadly defined as the fear of missing something or someone more interesting, exciting or better than what we're currently doing - such as booking to see Andrew O'Hagan at the book festival, and wishing you were at Turandot at the New Town Theatre.

Specifically, according to a recent New York Times article, it "refers to the blend of anxiety, inadequacy and irritation that can flare up while skimming social media."

BILLIE'S ENCORE

THE Billie Holiday Story with Nina Kristofferson was dubbed a "brilliant cocktail" of stories and songs from Holiday's life, leaving no-one quite understanding why its run finished at the Assembly on August 14.

Now extra late-night dates have been added at the New Town Theatre. The show's musical director and pianist, Warren Wills, is already appearing in the venue with the Sneasons of Liz cabaret. "It's a brilliant show," said the Universal Arts director Tomek Borkowy. "We've got the piano and our oak-lined mysterious venue is the perfect setting for Nina's beautiful, expressive voice."

RIGHT ON MCHUGH

Actor Greg McHugh, best known for his role as Gary: Tank Commander, appears at the book festival today. He reads the part of Bob Servant, the "unemployed gigolo" of Dundee, in an event with author Neil Forsyth.

Forsyth's book Delete This At Your Peril, relates how the fictional Bob Servant begins a running correspondence with a series of e-mail scammers, from mysterious Africans offering massive inheritances to Russians promising mail-order brides, taking on internet fraudsters at their own game and responding with outlandish schemes of his own.

Forsyth and McHugh, right, will be joined by Kirstin McLean (Limmy's Show) and Dave Anderson (starring in Federer vs Murray at Assembly) who will be reading the parts of the e-mail scammers. McHugh has just launched the BBC comedy star's first iPhone game. As camp commander Sgt Gary McLintoch, he appears in Stop That Tank! The game is inspired by the episode in Series Two of Gary: Tank Commander where Gary and his pals lose their tank while eating chips at a motorway service station.

COSMIC GIRL

Last time she was in Edinburgh, Charmian Hughes was channelling the spirit of Greyfriars Bobby using her own dog, Arthur, in Greyfriars Bobby Speaks To The World. She picked a volunteer from the audience, and met her future husband.

Nearly 20 years later the stand-up comic is back, with her two children old enough to leave behind. She describes herself as "army child, convent school survivor, one of the first girls to attend Westminster School, St Andrews graduate, first snogged by cabinet minister (at time of writing) Chris Huhne, gave Frank Skinner his first avocado". Her show is Cosmic Secrets, The Meaning Of Life And Sand Dancing. In it she promises to deconstruct "world religions, human love, the joy of pets, the story of Abelard and Heloise and the hidden danger of leaving it too late to see the dentist".