I spent this afternoon watching TV shows. But I was being paid to do so. It was my job. I was doing research for my appearance on Charlie Brooker's "You Have Been Watching" which is recorded on Sunday and broadcast at 10pm on Tuesday on Channel 4.
But even for four hours for my job to be to watch TV was a major triumph and vindication for the teenage me, who could not have wished for a better job. Even, though as it turned out, for half an hour I had to watch "The One Show", it was still worth it.
I imagine (I certainly don't actually remember it) that my parents used to chide me as I sat in front of the idiot's lantern and said. "You'll never make a living watching television." And yet here I was, just a quarter of a century later being paid (in theory) for doing exactly that. Sure it had taken me 25 years, but still, one in the eye for my unimaginative parents who might never actually have said such a thing anyway.
It was all my teenage dreams come true. Except that Janet Ellis wasn't sitting beside me naked. And anyone who says she was is lying.
I also got to watch a week's worth of "Come Dine With Me" which is a terrific show, mainly thanks to the sterling work of sarcastic narrator Dave Lamb. Though this week had an amazing amount of thrills and spills and borderline mental guests and there were tears and tantrums and I enjoyed it all thoroughly. I don't generally enjoy cookery programmes, but this one is about so much more. I am sure many of you have seen it. If you haven't, then watch it. It's not a recommendation that I can make about "The One Show". That is best left unwatched.
Finally I had to view a programme from America which attempted to determine the deadliest warrior between a gladiator and an Apache. It was hypnotically fascinating. I enjoyed it mainly in an ironic fashion, as it was about men using computers and machismo and replications of the human body to prove which was the most effective warrior of the two types of warrior who would never and could never actually meet. It was gruesome and ridiculous and totally brilliant. After an hour of looking at the merits of the weapons in both their arsenals, the Apache ended up winning because he had a bow and arrow and could shoot the Gladiator from a distance. How brilliant! What a waste or my beautiful life.
I also watched the pilot ep of "You Have Been Watching" and I have high hopes that it will be a hilarious and enjoyable series. If you've seen Screenwipe or Newswipe or read his books or Guardian columns, then you'll know how entertaining Charlie Brooker is. He's one of my favourites and I am very excited about taking part in the first broadcast show of this series. Hope you'll tune in.
Self-publicising twat.
I was also flattered to get more than a passing mention in
this article on Chortle. As has happened a few times in the long, long years that I have been writing this crap, it feels as if, perhaps I am on the verge of getting somewhere and achieving some kind of recognition. A fee recent Chortle articles have mentioned my name.
It is nice to know that my efforts are starting to get some attention, but I particularly like the article for its fine summing up of the situation I am in, "Only time will decide whether he is the most groundbreaking comedian of this internet age, or an idiot."
The scary thing is that I think Adam Gilder is bang on. I am either one or the other. There's nothing in between. And it's probably the latter option. But let's keep pressing on to find out.
I shall either destroy TV or make no mark on this world.
It is one or the other.
Before my gig tonight I sat in the beer garden of the pub looking over my notes. The clientele of the bar eyed me and my toothbrush moustache with some suspicion. I began to wonder if tonight might be the night it all kicked off. But nothing happened.
One man wore a rugby shirt with a large St George's flag on the back. I judged him as harshly as surely the rest of the punters were judging me. But in all likelihood he was as innocent and nice a man as I am in fact. But interesting too that the flag of my nation has such overbearing negative connotations. Surely we should be proud of it. But because of idiots championing it, it now means something other than it should.
Don't judge a book by its cover. Or an Englishman by his flag. Or a comedian by his Hitler moustache.
