5153/18073
Annoyed to see that that fucker Adolf Hitler has totally ripped off my Edinburgh poster in order to sell his stupid book. He’s done some rum stuff that guy, but this takes the biscuit. And that’s why you can’t trust fascists.
My post-Christmas health kick is going well, although I don’t seem to be losing any weight (and I have a lot to lose). Since Christmas Day I haven’t eaten any chocolate and have only drunk one glass of whiskey (on New Year’s Eve) and I’ve been back to calorie counting and lightly exercising every day. Today I pushed things a little bit and went for a slow and plodding three and a bit mile run in 35mins. I got to about 5 minutes in and felt like I wanted to stop, as I often have of late, but I decided to push on through. And once I made that decision I found the rest of the run pretty easy. The psychological hurdle is the trickiest one to jump…. oh no hang on. I’ve just looked at some real hurdles and I have no chance of getting over those with my short legs.
I got down to the Thames at Hammersmith, which is always a positive sign. My aim is to be back running my full six and a bit mile circuit before we move (whenever that might be), but for the moment, just seeing the familiar waters that I have run past and for a brief time rowed on in the last 14 years is enough. There weren’t many people around and everything looked beautiful.
A group of three people were walking towards me and a man in a puffy coat with his hood up waved at me. Oh no, here we go again, autograph hunters. Like that time in 2001. But as I got closer I realised it was someone I knew, Ben Bailey Smith aka Doc Brown. I ran in and hugged him, which thinking about it he might not have really wanted as I was lightly perspiring. He was impressed that I was out running, whilst I told him I was amazed that I’d got this far. Even though we only talked for a minute he managed to diss my headphones. "Staying loyal to the brand?" he said, noticing I was wearing the headphones that come with the iPhone. Now I don't really care about this stuff, but Ben is cool and I didn't want to let him down. And the truth was I have some super cool (possibly) Bose wireless headphones, but I have misplaced them so was making do. I tried to explain this but just looked like someone who was pretending to have better headphones at home.
He was about to film something, which to be fair is more impressive than an obese man running by a river. Or at least equally impressive. I had been flagging a little bit, but again the psychology of getting a hug from a handsome man with a positive energy boosted me and helped me get home. Even though he couldn’t see me I wanted to impress him. A bit like God feels about me. Anyway I should get fit pretty quickly, as long as Doc Brown keeps walking along the tow path between Hammersmith and Barnes (though probably stick at the Hammersmith end for the next few weeks to be safe).
As annoyed with myself as I am that I have had to start this all from scratch again (it’s mainly my baby’s fault to be fair and I will never forgive her for making me too tired to exercise and reliant on sugary snacks and booze to get through the last 23 months) it feels good to be giving it a proper go. Though the triple whammy of eating less, moving more and trying to get some work done is knocking the stuffing out of me. I didn’t get loads done on the sitcom, but typically by the time I got to bed, so tired that my head hurt, I started having lots of ideas and couldn’t sleep. But was too tired to turn on the light and write them down. So I’ve forgotten them all. Screw you brain, you fucking idiot.
The International Waters podcast I did before Christmas (before I stopped drinking) is here
My tour resumes this month and all January dates are already sold out. So book for the ones for February to May quickly. I am up against 95 other touring shows this year. Oooh shit.
There are only two more AIOTMs left to record (and write of course) and they're both selling well. If we can sell them both out then we can afford to do a couple more days of filming on sketches. All the money we get from the door will go to making new content. Come along. They are super fun!
And also at the Leicester Square Theatre in February are my only London dates for The Best.
Remember you have the power to stop these promotional messages. Just buy all the tickets to these shows. Simples.
