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I created over 4 hours of podcasts today. I am edging ever closer to 24/7 podcasting of my life. I was out at 7.42am to walk the dog and realised that this might be my only opportunity this week to record a stone clearing podcast, so practically 45 minutes of me walking round a field giving advice was in the bag
and up online by 10.30am (stone clearers of the past would not believe that was possible).
Then my wife and I went to look round a local primary school. Unbelievably we shortly have to make a decision about which school our oldest goes to. Although she’s already at nursery most days of the week, it seems impossible that her first day at proper school is less than a year away. I didn’t podcast this though, but was impressed with the school, which is a shame, because it’s not one that is in walking distance of our house.
And from there I came into London early to do my research for this week’s RHLSTP and then to record a podcast with the Scummy Mummies in my dressing room at the theatre. We ended up chatting for over an hour, being fairly honest, but hopefully funny about the difficulties that being a parent creates.
And as if that wasn’t enough, I then had two of my own proper non-stone podcasts to do (Don’t tell anyone, but I record two every week- Keep the Secret). First up was the impossibly handsome, and annoyingly smart and witty Rick Edwards. You are allowed to be clever or handsome, not both (I opted for the handsome route myself). I had watched an episode of Impossible, his quiz show, this afternoon. It just shows how much parenthood has changed my life, but I hadn’t seen this before, or really any pre-5pm quiz shows for years. And this is a really neat idea, where the questions get more and more challenging. And Rick is very good on it. He’s not Ben Shepherd, but then who is?
We had a fun chat with some mutual piss taking, but some funny stories of working on T4 and more, plus I remembered Bailey’s Comets and no one else did.
My second guest was a man who challenges Michael Palin as the nicest man in showbiz and a brilliant actor, writer and improviser, Sanjeev Bhaskar. I’ve been trying to get him on since this thing started, but he exceeded my high expectations: funny, intelligent and honest. His story of the way an executive thought he could improve the Kumars is possibly the best ever tale of awful interference from idiots, but Sanjeev’s sudden rise to fame is an equally interesting story of actual coin-tossing luck, some epic bullshitting and luckily the talent to back it up.
I had a lovely time again, and somehow wasn’t talked out. And still operated vaguely efficiently on 3 craft beers.
Tomorrow we start recording Relativity, so rather than going home, getting to be late only to get up early and leave immediately, I stayed in a hotel near the recording studio. I was briefly flummoxed by there being two Holiday Inns within spitting distance of each other, but by 12.30am I was in my room, missing my family and having spent almost a quarter of my day making podcasts.
My first appearance of House of Games was broadcast - spoilers coming up if you haven’t seen it yet- and in spite of some good quizzing, I blanked out a bit on one of my favourite rounds, that I’ve always been pretty good at, recognising the song from the first letters of all the words and ended up in a dispiriting third place. Though against tough opposition. And there’s quite a tussle to come, so stay tuned quiz fans.
