Life-affirming comedy was not what I expected from Josie Long's stand-up but her observational humour is imbued with optimism and refreshingly does not depend on criticising, humiliating or diminishing others. This I feel (and envy) is a reflection of her own view of life - love the universe and everything - and is most humorously demonstrated in her latest stand-up show.

The performance opened with a brief introduction by Josie in which she genially engaged the Oxford audience, interacting warmly with hecklers – I have seen Jo Brand reduce similar commentators to puddles but Josie addressed remarks as if they came jokingly from friends and expanded with comments on town and gown and the air of privilege eminent in the city, which as an alumni of Lady Margaret Hall she must be familiar with. I had expected her comedy to be more politically orientated and during this opening piece she did cast a few comedic aspersions at the establishment - “I was grammar school educated which in retrospect I object to”. This led to a discussion of her recent study for her maths A level; her experience in education today and the witty insight she has of the character of the teenagers in her study group.

David Trent's support act did, however, bring a more political note to the evening's comedy. At first I was concerned he was following Dave Gorman's PowerPoint format but he took this to another acerbic level with his amendment of and comment on the images he was showing. I enjoyed immensely his comedic dissection of Robin Thicke and Pharrell William's hit song 'Blurred Lines', as I thought I was one of the few people in the world who found this track offensive, and the routine was particularly pertinent given the $6m paid to Marvin Gaye's family this week for plagiarism in respect of this song. Also David's satirical exploration of Michael Gove's (one of my bête noirs), rapping abilities drolly brought home the idiocies of politicians and their attempts to engage with the electorate.

As a former employee of children's social care I am well used to reflecting on my own and others' behaviour and this is a technique Josie used throughout her stand-up to explore the nature of relationships and intimacy through the light of her own experience. However, this was not done in a dark or pessimistic way, but was open, honest and most importantly funny. She did employ a variety of techniques in this exploration and I laughed particularly at the comments/impressions from early American film noir actresses and was amused not only by the pithiness of her observations but also as her accent ranged from Kathryn Hepburn to Mae West with a lot of drawl in between.

Whilst discussing relationships it would have been easy for the humour to centre cruelly on the shortfalls of her former partners, but Josie's jokes were focussed on her own shortcomings, romanticism and wishful thinking. By the end of the show I, and I expect the majority of the audience, felt friendly, familiar and comfortable with her and most importantly stimulated and amused by her routine. The show ended with a warm and funny explanation of its title, Cara Josephine, and Josie's enthusiastic, unexpected and loving reaction to the birth of her niece. She explained that this life-affirming experience was underlined by her belief that her niece is named after her, but this assumption was undermined when her sister explained that the baby was also, and more importantly, named after her grandmother. This was a comic ploy typical of the night's entertainment – Josie Long set herself up and then burst her own bubble to much laughter and everyone's amusement.